The  Shadow 
on  the  Dial 
and  other  Essays 


Edited  by 

S.  O.  HOWES. 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial 
and  other  Essays    j&   j& 

By 
AMBROSE  BIERCE 


SAN  FRANCISCO 

A.  M.  ROBERTSON 
1909 


Copyright  1909 

By 
A.  M.  ROBERTSON 

BELCHER 


Printed  and  Bound  by 

The  Hicks- Judd  Company 

San  Francisco 


A  Note  by  the  Author 


T  WAS  expected  that  this  book 
would  be  included  in  my  "Col 
lected  Works"  now  in  course  of 
publication,  but  unforeseen  delay 
in  the  date  of  publication  has  made  this  impos 
sible.  The  selection  of  its  contents  was  not 
made  by  me,  but  the  choice  has  my  approval 
and  the  publication  my  authority. 

AMBROSE  BIERCE. 

Washington,  D.  C,  March  14,   1909. 


198439 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 


Contents 


Page 

Preface     .         .        <        .        *        .        .        .         ,         .  ix 
The  Shadow  on  the  Dial       ../      .         '.   \     ,     p|f     „      |||        1 

Civilization          .         .         •        *,        •         .         .         .         .  25 

The  Game  of  Politics    v<     .         .     :jjjj)     .         *         .         .  41 

Some  Features  of  the  Law         ......  61 

Arbitration ;         .V'   V        v  85 

Industrial  Discontent    .         .         .         .         ...        V  95 

Crime  and  its  Correctives         .        >        #     ,   ..       .         .         *  113 

The  Death  Penalty    ....         .         ,         .         .  125 

Religion >        .         f        V        ,  141 

Immortality          ....        >.         .         .         ,         .  159 

Opportunity    .         .         .         .         .         *         •         •         «         »  167 

Charity V       .         .         .^  173 

Emancipated  Woman      ....         *         .         .         .  179 

The  Opposing  Sex .V       .  187 

The  American  Sycophant 205 

A  Dissertation  on  Dogs 217 

The  Ancestral  Bond 231 

The  Right  to  Work 237 

The  Right  to  Take  Oneself  Off 243 


VII 


Preface 

HE  note  of  prophecy!  It  sounds  sharp  and  clear 
in  many  a  vibrant  line,  in  many  a  sonorous  sen 
tence  of  the  essays  herein  collected  for  the  first 
time.  Written  for  various  Californian  journals 
and  periodicals  and  extending  over  a  period  of  more  than  a 
quarter  of  a  century,  these  opinions  and  reflections  express  the 
refined  judgment  of  one  who  has  seen,  not  as  through  a  glass 
darkly,  the  trend  of  events.  And  having  seen  the  portentous 
effigy  that  we  are  making  of  the  Liberty  our  fathers  created, 
he  has  written  of  it  in  English  that  is  the  despair  of  those  who, 
thinking  less  clearly,  escape  not  the  pitfalls  of  diffuseness  and 
obscurity.  For  Mr.  Bierce,  as  did  Flaubert,  holds  that  the 
right  word  is  necessary  for  the  conveyance  of  the  right  thought 
and  his  sense  of  word  values  rarely  betrays  him  into  error.  But 
with  an  odd — I  might  almost  say  perverse — indifference  to  his 
own  reputation,  he  has  allowed  these  writings  to  lie  fallow  in 
the  old  files  of  papers,  while  others,  possessing  the  knack  of 
publicity,  years  later  tilled  the  soil  with  some  degree  of  success. 
President  Hadley,  of  Yale  University,  before  the  Candle 
Light  Club  of  Denver,  January  8,  1 900,  advanced,  as  novel 
and  original,  ostracism  as  an  effective  punishment  of  social 
highwaymen.  This  address  attracted  widespread  attention, 
and  though  Professor  Hadley's  remedy  has  not  been  generally 
adopted  it  is  regarded  as  his  own.  Mr.  Bierce  wrote  in  "The 
Examiner,"  January  20,  1895,  as  follows:  "We  are  plun 
dered  because  we  have  no  particular  aversion  to  plunderers. 

IX 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

The  'predatory  rich*  (to  use  Mr.  Stead's  felicitous  term)  put 
their  hands  into  our  pockets  because  they  know  that,  virtually, 
none  of  us  will  refuse  to  take  their  hands  in  our  own  after 
wards,  in  friendly  salutation.  If  notorious  rascality  entailed 
social  outlawry  the  only  rascals  would  be  those  properly — and 
proudly — belonging  to  the  'criminal  class.' ' 

Again,  Edwin  Markham  has  attracted  to  himself  no  little 
attention  by  advocating  the  application  of  the  Golden  Rule  in 
temporal  affairs  as  a  cure  for  evils  arising  from  industrial  dis 
content.  In  this  he,  too,  has  been  anticipated.  Mr.  Bierce, 
writing  in  "The  Examiner,"  March  25,  1894,  said:  "When 
a  people  would  avert  want  and  strife,  or  having  them,  would 
restore  plenty  and  peace,  this  noble  commandment  offers  the 
only  means — all  other  plans  for  safety  and  relief  are  as  vain  as 
dreams,  and  as  empty  as  the  crooning  of  fools.  And,  behold, 
here  it  is:  'All  things  whatsoever  ye  would  that  men  should 
do  to  you,  do  ye  even  so  to  them.' ' 

Rev.  Charles  M.  Sheldon  created  a  nine  days*  wonder,  or 
rather  a  seven,  by  conducting  for  a  week  a  newspaper  as  he 
conceived  Christ  would  have  done.  Some  years  previously, 
June  28,  1896,  to  be  exact,  the  author  of  these  essays  wrote: 
"That  is  my  ultimate  and  determining  test  of  right — 'What, 
under  the  circumstances,  would  Christ  have  done?' — the  Christ 
of  the  New  Testament,  not  the  Christ  of  the  commentators, 
theologians,  priests  and  parsons." 

I  am  sure  that  Mr.  Bierce  does  not  begrudge  any  of  these 
gentlemen  the  acclaim  they  have  received  by  enunciating  his 
ideas,  and  I  mention  the  instances  here  merely  to  forestall  the 
filing  of  any  other  claim  to  priority. 

The  essays  cover  a  wide  range  of  subjects,  embracing 
among  other  things  government,  dreams,  writers  of  dialect,  and 


Preface 

dogs,  and  always  the  author's  point  of  view  is  fresh,  original 
and  non-Philistine.  Whether  one  cares  to  agree  with  him  or 
not,  one  will  find  vast  entertainment  in  his  wit  that  illuminates 
with  lightning  flashes  all  he  touches.  Other  qualities  I  forbear 
allusion  to,  having  already  encroached  too  much  upon  the  time 
of  the  reader. 

S.  O.  HOWES. 


XI 


The  Shadow 
on   the   Dial 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial 


i*  • 

Of 

I. 

HERE  is  a  deal  of  confusion  and  uncertainty  in 
the  use  of  the  words  "Socialist,"  "Anarchist," 
and  "Nihilist."  Even  the  '1st  himself  commonly 
knows  with  as  little  accuracy  what  he  is  as  the 
rest  of  us  know  why  he  is.  The  Socialist  believes  that  most 
human  affairs  should  be  regulated  and  managed  by  the  State — 
the  Government — that  is  to  say,  the  majority.  Our  own 
system  has  many  Socialistic  features  and  the  trend  of  republican 
government  is  all  that  way.  The  Anarchist  is  the  kind  of 
lunatic  who  believes  that  all  crime  is  the  effect  of  laws  for 
bidding  it — as  the  pig  that  breaks  into  the  kitchen  garden  is 
created  by  the  dog  that  chews  its  ear!  The  Anarchist  favors 
abolition  of  all  law  and  frequently  belongs  to  an  organization 
that  secures  his  allegiance  by  solemn  oaths  and  dreadful  pen 
alties.  "Nihilism"  is  a  name  given  by  Turgenieff  to  the  general 
body  of  Russian  discontent  which  finds  expression  in  antagon 
izing  authority  and  killing  authorities.  Constructive  politics 
would  seem,  as  yet,  to  be  a  cut  above  the  Nihilist's  intelligence ; 
he  is  essentially  a  destructionary.  He  is  so  "diligently  engaged 
in  unweeding  the  soil  that  he  has  not  given  a  thought  to  what 
he  will  grow  there.  Nihilism  may  be  described  as  a  policy  of 
assassination  tempered  by  reflections  upon  Siberia.  American 
sympathy  with  it  is  the  offspring  of  an  unholy  union  between 
the  tongue  of  a  liar  and  the  ear  of  a  dupe. 

3 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

Upon  examination  it  will  be  seen  that  political  dissent, 
when  it  takes  any  form  more  coherent  than  the  mere  brute  dis 
satisfaction  of  a  mind  that  does  not  know  what  it  wants  to  want, 
finds  expression  in  one  of  but  two  ways — in  Socialism  or  in 
Anarchism.  Whatever  methods  one  may  think  will  best  sub 
stitute  for  a  system  gradually  evolved  from  our  needs  and  our 
natures  a  system  existing  only  in  the  minds  of  dreamers,  one  is 
bound  to  choose  between  these  two  dreams.  Yet  such  is  the 
intellectual  delinquency  of  many  who  most  strenuously 
denounce  the  system  that  we  have  that  we  not  infrequently  find 
the  same  man  advocating  in  one  breath,  Socialism,  in  the  next, 
Anarchism.  Indeed,  few  of  these  sons  of  darkness  know  that 
even  as  coherent  dreams  the  two  are  incompatible.  With 
Anarchy  triumphant  the  Socialist  would  be  a  thousand  years 
further  from  realization  of  his  hope  than  he  is  today.  Set  up 
Socialism  on  a  Monday  and  on  Tuesday  the  country  would 
be  en  fete,  gaily  hunting  down  Anarchists.  There  would  be 
little  difficulty  in  trailing  them,  for  they  have  not  so  much  sense 
as  a  deer,  which,  running  down  the  wind,  sends  its  tell-tale 
fragrance  on  before. 

Socialism  and  Anarchism  are  the  two  extremes  of  political 
thought;  they  are  parts  of  the  same  thing,  in  the  sense  that  the 
terminal  points  of  a  road  are  parts  of  the  same  road.  Between 
them,  about  midway,  lies  the  system  that  we  have  the  happiness 
to  endure.  It  is  a  "blend"  of  Socialism  and  Anarchism  in 
about  equal  parts:  all  that  is  not  one  is  the  other.  Everything 
serving  the  common  interest,  or  looking  to  the  welfare  of  the 
whole  people,  is  socialistic,  in  the  strictest  sense  of  the  word 
as  understood  by  the  Socialist.  Whatever  tends  to  private 
advantage  or  advances  an  individual  or  class  interest  at 
the  expense  of  a  public  one,  is  anarchistic.  Cooperation  is 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial 


Socialism;  competition  is  Anarchism.  Competition  carried  to 
its  logical  conclusion  (which  only  cooperation  prevents  or  can 
prevent)  would  leave  no  law  in  force,  no  property  possible,  no 
life  secure. 

Of  course  the  words  "cooperation"  and  "competition"  are 
not  here  used  in  a  merely  industrial  and  commercial  sense ;  they 
are  intended  to  cover  the  whole  field  of  human  activity.  Two 
voices  singing  a  duet — that  is  cooperation — Socialism.  Two 
voices  singing  each  a  different  tune  and  trying  to  drown  each 
other — that  is  competition — Anarchism:  each  is  a  law  unto 
itself — that  is  to  say,  it  is  lawless.  Everything  that  ought  to 
be  done  the  Socialist  hopes  to  do  by  associated  endeavor,  as  an 
army  wins  battles;  Anarchism  is  socialistic  in  its  means  only: 
by  cooperation  it  tries  to  render  cooperation  impossible — com 
bines  to  kill  combination.  Its  method  says  to  its  purpose: 
"Thou  fool!" 


II. 


Everything  foretells  the  doom  of  authority.  The  killing 
of  kings  is  no  new  industry ;  it  is  as  ancient  as  the  race.  Always 
and  everywhere  persons  in  high  place  have  been  the  assassin's 
prey.  We  have  ourselves  lost  three  Presidents  by  murder,  and 
will  doubtless  lose  many  another  before  the  book  of  American 
history  is  closed.  If  anything  is  new  in  this  activity  of  the 
regicide  it  is  found  in  the  choice  of  victims.  The  contemporary 
"avenger"  slays,  not  the  merely  great,  but  the  good  and  the 
inoffensive — an  American  President  who  had  struck  the  chains 
from  millions  of  slaves;  a  Russian  Czar  who  against  the  will 
and  work  of  his  own  powerful  nobles  had  freed  their  serfs;  a 
French  President  from  whom  the  French  people  had  received 

5 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

nothing  but  good ;  a  powerless  Austrian  Empress,  whose  weight 
of  sorrows  touched  the  world  to  tears ;  a  blameless  Italian  King 
beloved  of  his  people ;  such  is  a  part  of  the  recent  record  of  the 
regicide  whose  every  entry  is  a  tale  of  infamy  unrelieved  by 
one  circumstance  of  justice,  decency  or  good  intention.  And 
the  great  Brazilian  liberator  died  in  exile. 

This  recent  uniformity  of  malevolence  in  the  choice  of 
victims  is  not  without  significance.  It  points  unmistakably  to 
two  facts :  first,  that  the  selections  are  made,  not  by  the  assassins 
themselves,  but  by  some  central  control  inaccessible  to  indi 
vidual  preference  and  unaffected  by  the  fortunes  of  its  instru 
ments;  second,  that  there  is  a  constant  purpose  to  manifest  an 
antagonism,  not  to  any  individual  ruler,  but  to  rulers;  not  to 
any  system  of  government,  but  to  Government.  It  is  a  war, 
not  upon  those  in  authority,  but  upon  Authority.  The  issue 
is  defined,  the  alignment  made,  the  battle  set:  Chaos  against 
Order,  Anarchy  against  Law. 

M.  Vaillant,  the  French  gentleman  who  lacked  a  "good 
opinion  of  the  law,"  but  was  singularly  rich  in  the  faith  that  by 
means  of  gunpowder  and  flying  nails  humanity  could  be 
brought  into  a  nearer  relation  with  reason,  righteousness  and 
the  will  of  God,  is  said  to  have  been  nearly  devoid  of  a  nose. 
Of  this  affliction  M.  Vaillant  made  but  slight  account,  as  was 
natural,  seeing  that  but  for  a  brief  season  did  he  need  even  so 
much  of  nose  as  remained  to  him.  Yet  before  its  effacement 
by  premature  disruption  of  his  own  petard  it  must  have  had  a 
certain  value  to  him — he  would  not  wantonly  have  renounced 
it ;  and  had  he  foreseen  its  extinction  by  the  bomb  the  iron  views 
of  that  controversial  device  would  probably  have  been  denied 
expression.  Albeit  (so  say  the  scientists)  doomed  to  eventual 
elimination  from  the  scheme  of  being,  and  to  the  Anarchist  even 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial 


now  something  of  an  accusing  conscience,  the  nose  is  indu 
bitably  an  excellent  thing  in  man. 

This  brings  us  to  consideration  of  the  human  nose  as  a 
measure  of  human  happiness — not  the  size  of  it,  but  its  num 
bers;  its  frequent  or  infrequent  occurrence  upon  the  human 
face.  We  have  grown  so  accustomed  to  the  presence  of  this 
feature  that  we  take  it  as  a  matter  of  course ;  its  absence  is  one 
of  the  most  notable  phenomena  of  our  observation — **an  occa 
sion  long  to  be  remembered,"  as  the  society  reporter  hath  it. 
Yet  "abundant  testimony  showeth"  that  but  two  or  three 
centuries  ago  noseless  men  and  women  were  so  common  all 
over  Europe  as  to  provoke  but  little  comment  when  seen  and 
(in  their  disagreeable  way)  heard.  They  abounded  in  all  the 
various  walks  of  life:  there  were  honored  burgomasters  with 
out  noses,  wealthy  merchants,  great  scholars,  artists,  teachers. 
Amongst  the  humbler  classes  nasal  destitution  was  almost  as 
frequent  as  pecuniary — in  the  humblest  of  all  the  most  com 
mon  of  all.  Writing  in  the  thirteenth  century,  Salsius  men 
tions  the  retainers  and  servants  of  certain  Suabian  noblemen  as 
having  hardly  a  whole  ear  among  them — for  until  a  compara 
tively  recent  period  man's  tenure  of  his  ears  was  even  more 
precarious  than  that  of  his  nose.  In  1436,  when  a  Bavarian 
woman,  Agnes  Bernaurian,  wife  of  Duke  Albert  the  Pious, 
was  dropped  off  the  bridge  at  Prague,  she  persisted  in  rising  to 
the  surface  and  trying  to  escape;  so  the  executioner  gave  him 
self  the  trouble  to  put  a  long  pole  into  her  hair  and  hold  her 
under.  A  contemporary  account  of  the  matter  hints  that  her 
disorderly  behavior  at  so  solemn  a  moment  was  due  to  the 
pain  caused  by  removal  of  her  nose;  but  as  her  execution  was 
by  order  of  her  own  father  it  seems  more  probable  that  "the 
extreme  penalty  of  the  law"  was  not  imposed.  Without  a 

7 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

doubt,  though,  possession  of  a  nose  was  an  uncommon  (and 
rather  barren)  distinction  in  those  days  among  "persons 
designated  to  assist  the  executioner,"  as  the  condemned  were 
civilly  called.  Nor,  as  already  said,  was  it  any  too  common 
among  persons  not  as  yet  consecrated  to  that  service:  "Few," 
says  Salsius,  "have  two  noses,  and  many  have  none." 

Man's  firmer  grasp  upon  his  nose  in  this  our  day  and  gen 
eration  is  not  altogether  due  to  invention  of  the  handkerchief. 
The  genesis  and  development  of  his  right  to  his  own  nose  have 
been  accompanied  with  a  corresponding  advance  in  the  pos 
sessory  rights  all  along  the  line  of  his  belongings — his  ears,  his 
fingers  and  toes,  his  skin,  his  bones,  his  wife  and  her  young, 
his  clothes  and  his  labor — everything  that  is  (and  that  once 
was  not)  his.  In  Europe  and  America  today  these  things  can 
not  be  taken  away  from  even  the  humblest  and  poorest  without 
somebody  wanting  to  "know  the  reason  why."  In  every  de 
cade  the  nation  that  is  most  powerful  upon  the  seas  incurs 
voluntarily  a  vast  expense  of  blood  and  treasure  in  suppressing 
a  slave  trade  which  in  no  way  is  injurious  to  her  interests,  nor 
to  the  interests  of  any  but  the  slaves. 

So  "Freedom  broadens  slowly  down,"  and  today  even 
the  lowliest  incapable  of  all  Nature's  aborted  has  a  nose  that 
he  dares  to  call  his  own  and  bite  off  at  his  own  sweet  will. 
Unfortunately,  with  an  unthinkable  fatuity  we  permit  him  to 
be  told  that  but  for  the  very  agencies  that  have  put  him  in  pos 
session  he  could  successfully  assert  a  God-given  and  world-old 
right  to  the  noses  of  others.  At  present  the  honest  fellow  is 
mainly  engaged  in  refreshing  himself  upon  his  own  nose,  con 
suming  that  comestible  with  avidity  and  precision;  but  the 
Vaillants,  Ravechols,  Mosts  and  Willeys  are  pointing  his 
appetite  to  other  snouts  than  his,  and  inspiring  him  with  rhino- 

8 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial 


phagic  ambition.    Meantime  the  rest  of  us  are  using  those  im 
periled  organs  to  snore  with. 

'Tis  a  fine,  resonant  and  melodious  snore,  but  it  is  not 
going  to  last:  there  is  to  be  a  rude  awakening.  We  shall  one 
day  get  our  eyes  open  to  the  fact  that  scoundrels  like  Vaillant 
are  neither  few  nor  distant.  We  shall  learn  that  our  blind  de 
pendence  upon  the  magic  of  words  is  a  fatuous  error;  that  the 
fortuitous  arrangement  of  consonants  and  vowels  which  we 
worship  as  Liberty  is  of  slight  efficacy  in  disarming  the  lunatic 
brandishing  a  bomb.  Liberty,  indeed !  The  murderous  wretch 
loves  it  a  deal  better  than  we,  and  wants  more  of  it.  Liberty! 
one  almost  sickens  of  the  word,  so  quick  and  glib  it  is  on  every 
lip — so  destitute  of  meaning. 

There  is  no  such  thing  as  abstract  liberty;  it  is  not  even 
thinkable.  If  you  ask  me,  "Do  you  favor  liberty?"  I  reply, 
"Liberty  for  whom  to  do  what?"  Just  now  I  distinctly  favor 
the  liberty  of  the  law  to  cut  off  the  noses  of  anarchists  caught 
red-handed  or  red-tongued.  If  they  go  in  for  mutilation  let 
them  feel  what  it  is  like.  If  they  are  not  satisfied  with  the 
way  that  things  have  been  going  on  since  the  wife  of  Duke 
Albert  the  Pious  was  held  under  water  with  a  pole,  and  since 
the  servitors  of  the  Suabian  nobleman  cherished  their  vesti 
gial  ears,  it  is  to  be  presumed  that  they  favor  reversion  to  that 
happy  state.  There  is  grave  objection,  but  if  we  must  we 
will.  Let  us  begin  (with  moderation)  by  reverting  them. 

1  favor  mutilation  for  anarchists  convicted  of  killing  or  in 
citing  to  kill — mutilation  followed  by  death.  For  those  who 
merely  deny  the  right  and  expediency  of  law,  plain  mutilation — 
which  might  advantageously  take  the  form  of  removal  of  the 
tongue.  Why  not?  Where  is  the  injustice?  Surely  he  who 
denies  men's  right  to  make  laws  will  not  invoke  the  laws  that 


OF 


UNIVERSITY  ) 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

they  have  wickedly  made!  That  were  to  say  that  they  must 
not  protect  themselves,  yet  are  bound  to  protect  him.  What! 
if  I  beat  him  will  he  call  the  useless  and  mischievous  con 
stabulary?  If  I  draw  out  his  tongue  shall  he  (in  the  sign- 
language)  demand  it  back,  and  failing  of  restitution  (for 
surely  I  should  cut  it  clean  away)  shall  he  have  the  law  on 
me — the  naughty  law,  instrument  of  the  oppressor?  Why? 
that  "goes  neare  to  be  fonny!" 

Two  human  beings  can  not  live  together  in  peace  without 
laws — laws  innumerable.  Everything  that  either,  in  considera 
tion  of  the  other's  wish  or  welfare,  abstains  from  is  inhibited  by 
law,  tacit  or  expressed.  If  there  were  in  all  the  world  none 
but  they —  if  neither  had  come  with  any  sense  of  obligation 
toward  the  other,  both  clean  from  creation,  with  nothing  but 
brains  to  direct  their  conduct — every  hour  would  evolve  an 
understanding,  that  is  to  say,  a  law;  every  act  would  suggest 
one.  They  would  have  to  agree  not  to  kill  nor  harm  each 
other.  They  must  arrange  their  work  and  all  their  activities  to 
secure  the  best  advantage.  These  arrangements,  agreements, 
understandings — what  are  they  but  laws?  To  live  without 
law  is  to  live  alone.  Every  family  is  a  miniature  State  with  a 
complicate  system  of  laws,  a  supreme  authority  and  subordinate 
authorities  down  to  the  latest  babe.  And  as  he  who  is  loudest 
in  demanding  liberty  for  himself  is  sternest  in  denying  it  to 
others,  you  may  confidently  go  to  the  Maison  Vaillant,  or 
the  Mosthaus,  for  a  flawless  example  of  the  iron  hand. 

Laws  of  the  State  are  as  faulty  and  as  faultily  administered 
as  those  of  the  Family.  Most  of  them  have  to  be  speedily  and 
repeatedly  "amended,"  many  repealed,  and  of  those  permitted 
to  stand,  the  greater  number  fall  into  disuse  and  are  forgotten. 
Those  who  have  to  be  entrusted  with  the  duty  of  administer- 

10 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial 


ing  them  have  all  the  limitations  of  intelligence  and  defects  of 
character  by  which  the  rest  of  us  also  are  distinguished  from 
the  angels.  In  the  wise  governor,  the  just  judge,  the  honest 
sheriff  or  the  patient  constable  we  have  as  rare  a  phenomenon 
as  the  faultless  father.  The  good  God  has  not  given  us  a 
special  kind  of  men  upon  whom  to  devolve  the  duty  of  seeing 
to  the  observance  of  the  understandings  that  we  call  laws. 
Like  all  else  that  men  do,  this  work  is  badly  done.  The  best 
that  we  can  hope  for  through  all  the  failures,  the  injustice,  the 
disheartening  damage  to  individual  rights  and  interests,  is  a 
fairly  good  general  result,  enabling  us  to  walk  abroad  among 
our  fellows  unafraid,  to  meet  even  the  tribesmen  from  another 
valley  without  too  imminent  peril  of  braining  and  evisceration. 
Of  that  small  security  the  Anarchist  would  deprive  us.  But 
without  that  nothing  is  of  value  and  we  shall  be  willing  to 
renounce  all.  Let  us  begin  by  depriving  ourselves  of  the 
Anarchist. 

Our  system  of  civilization  being  the  natural  outgrowth  of 
our  wretched  moral  and  intellectual  natures,  is  open  to  criticism 
and  subject  to  revision.  Our  laws,  being  of  human  origin, 
are  faulty  and  their  application  is  disappointing.  Dissent, 
dissatisfaction,  deprecation,  proposals  for  a  better  system 
fortified  with  better  laws  more  intelligently  administered — 
these  are  permissible  and  should  be  welcome.  The  Socialist 
(when  he  is  not  carried  away  by  zeal  to  pool  issues  with  the 
Anarchist)  has  that  in  him  which  it  does  us  good  to  hear.  He 
may  be  wrong  in  all  else,  yet  right  in  showing  us  wherein  we 
ourselves  are  wrong.  Anyhow,  his  mission  is  amendment,  and 
so  long  as  his  paths  are  peace  he  has  the  right  to  walk  therein, 
exhorting  as  he  goes.  The  French  Communist  who  does  not 
preach  Petroleum  and  It  rectified  is  to  be  regarded  with  more 

11 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

than  amusement,  more  than  compassion.  There  is  room  for 
him  and  his  fad;  there  are  hospitable  ears  for  his  boast  that 
Jesus  Christ  would  have  been  a  Communist  if  there  had  been 
Communes.  They  really  did  not  "know  everything  down  in 
Judee."  But  for  the  Anarchist,  whose  aim  is  not  amendment, 
but  destruction — not  welfare  to  the  race,  but  mischief  to  a 
part  of  it — not  happiness  for  the  future,  but  revenge  for  the 
past — for  that  animal  there  should  be  no  close  season,  for 
that  savage,  no  reservation.  Society  has  not  the  right  to  grant 
life  to  one  who  denies  the  right  to  live.  The  protagonist  of 
reversion  to  the  regime  of  lacking  noses  should  lack  a  nose. 

It  is  difficult  to  say  if  the  bomb-thrower,  actual  or  potential, 
is  greater  as  scoundrel  or  fool.  Suppose  his  aim  is  to  compel 
concession  by  terror.  Can  not  the  brute  observe  at  each  of  his 
exploits  a  tightening  of  "the  reins  of  power?"  Through  the 
necessity  of  guarding  against  him  the  mildest  governments  are 
becoming  despotic,  the  most  despotic  more  despotic.  Does 
he  suppose  that  "the  rulers  of  the  earth"  are  silly  enough  to 
make  concessions  that  will  not  insure  their  safety?  Can  he  give 
them  security? 

III. 

Of  all  the  wild  asses  that  roam  the  plain,  the  wildest  wild 
ass  that  roams  the  plain  is  indubitably  the  one  that  lifts  his 
voice  and  heel  against  that  socialism  known  as  "public  owner 
ship  of  public  utilities,"  on  the  ground  of  "principle."  There 
may  be  honest,  and  in  some  degree  intelligent,  opposition  on  the 
ground  of  expediency.  Many  persons  whom  it  is  a  pleasure 
to  respect  believe  that  a  Government  railway,  for  example, 
would  be  less  efficiently  managed  than  the  same  railway  in 

12 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial 


private  hands,  and  that  political  dangers  lurk  in  the  proposal 
so  enormously  to  increase  the  number  of  Federal  employes  as 
Government  ownership  of  railways  would  entail.  They  think, 
in  other  words,  that  the  policy  is  inexpedient.  It  is  a  duty 
to  reason  with  them,  which,  as  a  rule,  one  can  do  without  being 
insulted.  But  the  chap  who  greets  the  proposal  with  a  howl 
of  derision  as  "Socialism!"  is  not  a  respectable  opponent. 
Eyes  he  has,  but  he  sees  not;  ears — oh!  very  abundant  ears — 
but  he  hears  not  the  still,  small  voice  of  history  nor  the  still 
smaller  voice  of  common  sense. 

Obviously  to  those  who,  having  eyes,  do  see,  public  owner 
ship  of  anything  is  a  step  in  the  direction  of  Socialism,  for 
perfect  Socialism  means  public  ownership  of  everything.  But 
"principle"  has  nothing  to  do  with  it.  The  principle  of  public 
ownership  is  already  accepted  and  established.  It  has  no  visible 
opponents  except  in  the  camp  of  the  Anarchists,  and  fewer 
of  them  are  visible  there  than  soap  and  water  would  reveal. 
Antagonists  of  the  principle  of  Socialism  lost  their  fight  when 
the  first  human  government  held  the  dedicatory  exercises  of  a 
Cave  of  Legislation.  Since  then  the  only  question  about  the 
matter  has  been  how  far  the  extension  of  Socialism  is  expedient. 
Some  would  draw  the  limiting  line  at  one  place,  some  at 
another;  but  only  a  fool  thinks  there  can  be  government  with 
out  it,  or  good  government  without  a  great  deal  of  it.  (The 
fact  that  we  have  always  had  a  great  deal  of  it,  yet  never  had 
good  government,  affirms  nothing  that  it  is  worth  while  to  con 
sider.)  The  word-worn  example  of  our  Postal  Department  is 
only  one  of  a  thousand  instances  of  pure  Socialism.  If  it  did 
not  exist,  how  bitter  an  opposition  a  proposal  to  establish  it 
would  evoke  from  Adversaries  of  the  Red  Rag!  The  Gov 
ernment  builds  and  operates  bridges  with  general  assent;  but, 

13 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

as  the  late  General  Walker  pointed  out,  it  might  under  some 
circumstances  be  more  economical,  or  better  otherwise,  to 
build  and  operate  a  ferry  boat,  which  is  a  floating  bridge.  But 
that  would  be  opposed  as  rank  Socialism. 

The  truth  is  that  the  men  and  women  of  "principle"  are  a 
pretty  dangerous  class,  generally  speaking — and  they  are 
generally  speaking.  It  is  they  that  hamper  us  in  every  war.  It 
is  they  who,  preventing  concentration  and  regulation  of  un- 
abolishable  evils,  promote  their  distribution  and  liberty.  Moral 
principles  are  pretty  good  things — for  the  young  and  those  not 
well  grounded  in  goodness.  If  one  have  an  impediment  in  his 
thought,  or  is  otherwise  unequal  to  emergencies  as  they  arise,  it 
is  safest  to  be  provided  beforehand  with  something  to  refer  to  in 
order  that  a  right  decision  may  be  made  without  taking  thought. 
But  "spirits  of  a  purer  fire"  prefer  to  decide  each  question  as 
it  comes  up,  and  to  act  upon  the  merits  of  the  case,  unbound 
and  unpledged.  With  a  quick  intelligence,  a  capable  con 
science  and  a  habit  of  doing  right  automatically  one  has  little 
need  to  burden  one's  mind  and  memory  with  a  set  of  solemn 
principles  formulated  by  owlish  philosophers  who  do  not 
happen  to  know  that  what  is  right  is  merely  what,  in  the  long 
run  and  with  regard  to  the  greater  number  of  cases,  is  expedi 
ent.  Principle  is  not  always  an  infallible  guide.  For  illustra 
tion,  it  is  not  always  expedient — that  is,  for  the  good  of  all 
concerned — to  tell  the  truth,  to  be  entirely  just  or  merciful,  to 
pay  a  debt.  I  can  conceive  a  case  in  which  it  would  be  right 
to  assassinate  one's  neighbor.  Suppose  him  to  be  a  desperate 
scoundrel  of  a  chemist  who  has  devised  a  means  of  setting  the 
atmosphere  afire.  The  man  who  should  go  through  life  on  an 
inflexible  line  of  principle  would  border  his  path  with  a  havoc 
of  human  happiness. 

14 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial 


What  one  may  think  perfect  one  may  not  always  think 
desirable.  By  "perfect"  one  may  mean  merely  complete,  and 
the  word  was  so  used  in  my  reference  to  Socialism.  I  am 
not  myself  an  advocate  of  "perfect  Socialism,"  but  as  to  Gov 
ernment  ownership  of  railways,  there  is  doubtless  a  good  deal 
to  be  said  on  both  sides.  One  argument  in  its  favor  appears 
decisive;  under  a  system  subject  to  popular  control  the  law  of 
gravitation  would  be  shorn  of  its  preeminence  as  a  means  of 
removing  personal  property  from  the  baggage  car,  and  so  far 
as  it  is  applicable  to  that  work  might  even  be  repealed. 

IV. 

When  M.  Casimir-Perier  resigned  the  French  Presidency 
there  were  those  who  regarded  the  act  as  weak,  cowardly, 
undutiful  and  otherwise  censurable.  It  seems  to  me  the  act, 
not  of  a  feeble  man,  but  of  a  strong  one — not  that  of  a 
coward,  but  that  of  a  gentleman.  Indeed,  I  hardly  know 
where  to  look  in  history  for  an  act  more  entirely  gratifying  to 
my  sense  of  "the  fitness  of  things"  than  this  dignified  notification 
to  mankind  that  in  consenting  to  serve  one's  country  one  does 
not  relinquish  the  right  to  decent  treatment — to  immunity  from 
factious  opposition  and  abuse — to  at  least  as  much  civil  con 
sideration  as  is  due  from  the  Church  to  the  Devil. 

M.  Casimir-Perier  did  not  seek  the  Presidency  of  the 
French  Republic;  it  was  thrust  upon  him  against  his  pro 
testations  by  an  apparently  almost  unanimous  mandate  of  the 
French  people  in  an  emergency  which  it  was  thought  that  he 
was  the  best  man  to  meet.  That  he  met  it  with  modesty  and 
courage  was  testified  without  dissent.  That  he  afterward  did 
anything  to  forfeit  the  confidence  and  respect  that  he  then  in- 

15 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

spired  is  not  true,  and  nobody  believes  it  true.  Yet  in  his 
letter  of  resignation  he  said,  and  said  truly : 

"For  the  last  six  months  a  campaign  of  slander  and  insult 
has  been  going  on  against  the  army,  magistrates,  Parliament 
and  hierarchical  Chief  of  State,  and  this  license  to  disseminate 
social  hatred  continues  to  be  called  'the  liberty  of  thought.' ' 

And  with  a  dignity  to  which  it  seems  strange  that  any  one 
could  be  insensible,  he  added: 

"The  respect  and  ambition  which  I  entertain  for  my 
country  will  not  allow  me  to  acknowledge  that  the  servants 
of  the  country,  and  he  who  represents  it  in  the  presence  of 
foreign  nations,  may  be  insulted  every  day." 

These  are  noble  words.  Have  we  any  warrant  for  de 
manding  or  expecting  that  men  of  clean  life  and  character  will 
devote  themselves  to  the  good  of  ingrates  who  pay,  and  in- 
grates  who  permit  them  to  pay,  in  flung  mud?  It  is  hardly 
credible  that  among  even  those  persons  most  infatuated  by  con 
templation  of  their  own  merit  as  pointed  out  by  their  thrifty 
sycophants  "the  liberty  of  thought"  has  been  carried  to  that 
extreme.  The  right  of  the  State  to  demand  the  sacrifice  of 
the  citizen's  life  is  a  doctrine  as  old  as  the  patriotism  that  con 
cedes  it,  but  the  right  to  require  him  to  forego  his  good  name — 
that  is  something  new  under  the  sun.  From  nothing  but  the 
dunghill  of  modern  democracy  could  so  noxious  a  plant  have 
sprung. 

"Perhaps  in  laying  down  my  functions,"  said  M.  Casimir- 
Perier,  "I  shall  have  marked  out  a  path  of  duty  to  those  who 
are  solicitous  for  the  dignity,  power  and  good  name  of  France 
in  the  world." 

We  may  be  permitted  to  hope  that  the  lesson  is  wider  than 
France  and  more  lasting  than  the  French  Republic.  It  is  time 

16 


The  Shadoiv  on  the  Dial 


that  not  only  France  but  all  other  countries  with  "popular 
institutions"  should  learn  that  if  they  wish  to  command  the 
services  of  men  of  honor  they  must  accord  them  honorable 
treatment;  the  rule  now  is  for  the  party  to  which  they  belong 
to  give  them  a  half-hearted  support  while  suffering  all  other 
parties  to  slander  and  insult  them.  The  action  of  the  Presi 
dent  of  the  French  Republic  in  these  disgusting  circumstances 
is  exceptional  and  unusual  only  in  respect  of  his  courage  in  ex 
pressly  resenting  his  wrong.  Everywhere  the  unreasonable 
complaint  is  heard  that  good  men  will  not  "go  into  politics;" 
everywhere  the  ignorant  and  malignant  masses  and  their  no 
less  malignant  and  hardly  less  ignorant  leaders  and  spokesmen, 
having  sown  the  wind  of  reasonless  obstruction  and  partisan 
vilification,  are  reaping  the  whirlwind  of  misrule.  So  far  as 
concerns  the  public  service,  gentlemen  are  mostly  on  a  strike 
against  introduction  of  the  mud-machine.  This  high-minded 
political  workman,  Casimir-Perier,  never  showed  to  so  noble 
advantage  as  in  gathering  up  his  tools  and  walking  out. 

It  may  be,  and  a  million  times  has  been,  urged  that  absten 
tion  from  activity  in  public  affairs  by  men  of  brains  and  charac 
ter  leaves  the  business  of  government  in  the  hands  of  the  in 
capable  and  the  vicious.  In  whose  hands,  pray,  in  a  republic, 
does  it  logically  belong?  What  does  the  theory  of  "repre 
sentative  government"  affirm?  What  is  the  lesson  of  every 
netherward  extension  of  the  suffrage?  What  do  we  mean  by 
permitting  it  to  "broaden  slowly  down"  to  lower  and  lower 
intelligences  and  moralities? — what  but  that  stupidity  and  vice, 
equally  with  virtue  and  wisdom,  are  entitled  to  a  voice  in 
political  affairs,  a  finger  in  the  public  pie? 

A  person  that  is  fit  to  vote  is  fit  to  be  voted  for.  He  who 
is  competent  for  the  high  and  difficult  function  of  choosing  an 

17 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

officer  of  the  State  is  competent  to  serve  the  State  as  an  officer. 
To  deny  him  the  right  is  illogical  and  unjust.  Participation  in 
Government  can  not  be  at  the  same  time  a  privilege  and  a  duty, 
and  he  who  claims  it  as  a  privilege  must  not  speak  of  another's 
renunciation  (whereby  himself  is  more  highly  privileged)  as 
"shirking."  With  every  retirement  from  politics  increased 
power  passes  to  those  who  remain.  Shall  they  protest?  Shall 
they,  also,  who  have  retired?  Who  else  is  to  protest?  The 
complaint  of  "incivism"  would  be  more  rational  if  there  were 
some  one  by  whom  it  could  reasonably  be  made. 

My  advice  to  slandered  officials  has  ever  been :  "Resign." 
The  public  officials  of  this  favored  country,  Heaven  be 
thanked,  are  infrequently  slandered :  they  are,  as  a  rule,  so  bad 
that  calumniation  is  a  compliment.  Our  best  men,  with  here 
and  there  an  exception,  have  been  driven  out  of  public  life,  or 
made  afraid  to  enter  it.  Even  our  spasmodic  efforts  at  reform 
fail  ludicrously  for  lack  of  leaders  unaffiliated  with  "the  thing 
to  be  reformed."  Unless  attracted  by  the  salary,  why  should 
a  gentleman  "aspire"  to  the  Presidency  of  the  United  States? 
During  his  canvass  (and  he  is  expected  to  "run,"  not  merely  to 
"stand")  he  will  have  from  his  own  party  a  support  that  should 
make  him  blush,  and  from  all  the  others  an  opposition  that  will 
stick  at  nothing  to  accomplish  his  satisfactory  defamation. 
After  his  election  his  partition  and  allotment  of  the  loaves  and 
fishes  will  estrange  an  important  and  thenceforth  implacable 
faction  of  his  following  without  appeasing  the  animosity  of  any 
one  else ;  and  during  his  entire  service  his  sky  will  be  dark  with 
a  flight  of  dead  cats.  At  the  finish  of  his  term  the  utmost  that 
he  can  expect  in  the  way  of  reward  not  expressible  in  terms  of 
the  national  currency  is  that  not  much  more  than  one-half  of  his 
countrymen  will  believe  him  a  scoundrel  to  the  end  of  their 
days.  lg 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial 


v. 

The  kind  of  government  that  we  have  seems  to  me  one  of 
the  worst  kinds  extant.  A  government  that  does  not  protect 
life  is  a  flat  failure,  no  matter  what  else  it  may  do.  Life  being 
almost  universally  regarded  as  the  most  precious  possession,  its 
security  is  the  first  and  highest  essential — not  the  life  of  him 
who  takes  life,  but  the  life  which  is  exposed  defenceless  to  his 
hateful  hand.  In  no  country  in  the  world,  civilized  or  savage, 
is  life  so  insecure  as  in  this.  In  no  country  in  the  world  is  mur 
der  held  in  so  light  reprobation.  In  no  battle  of  modern  times 
have  so  many  lives  been  taken  as  are  lost  annually  in  the  United 
States  through  public  indifference  to  the  crime  of  homicide — 
through  disregard  of  law,  through  bad  government.  If  Ameri 
can  self-government,  with  its  ten  thousand  homicides  a  year,  is 
good  government,  there  is  no  such  thing  as  bad.  Self-govern 
ment!  What  monstrous  nonsense!  Who  governs  himself 
needs  no  government,  has  no  governor,  is  not  governed.  If 
government  has  any  meaning  it  means  the  restraint  of  the  many 
by  the  few — the  subordination  of  numbers  to  brains.  It  means 
the  determined  denial  to  the  masses  of  the  right  to  cut  their  own 
throats.  It  means  the  grasp  and  control  of  all  the  social  forces 
and  material  enginery — a  vigilant  censorship  of  the  press,  a 
firm  hand  upon  the  church,  keen  supervision  of  public  meetings 
and  public  amusements,  command  of  the  railroads,  telegraph 
and  all  means  of  communication.  It  means,  in  short,  the  ability 
to  make  use  of  all  the  beneficent  influences  of  enlightenment 
for  the  good  of  the  people,  and  to  array  all  the  powers  of  civili 
zation  against  civilization's  natural  enemies — the  people.  Gov 
ernment  like  this  has  a  thousand  defects,  but  it  has  one  merit: 
it  is  government. 

19 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

Despotism?  Yes.  It  is  the  despotisms  of  the  world  that 
have  been  the  conservators  of  civilization.  It  is  the  despot  who, 
most  powerful  for  mischief,  is  alone  powerful  for  good.  It  is 
conceded  that  government  is  necessary — even  by  the  "fierce 
democracies"  that  madly  renounce  it.  But  in  so  far  as  govern 
ment  is  not  despotic  it  is  not  government.  In  Europe  for  the 
last  one  hundred  years,  the  tendency  of  all  government  has  been 
liberalization.  The  history  of  European  politics  during  that 
period  is  a  history  of  renunciation  by  the  rulers  and  assumption 
by  the  ruled.  Sovereign  after  sovereign  has  surrendered  pre 
rogative  after  prerogative;  the  nobility  privilege  after  privilege. 
Mark  the  result:  society  honeycombed  with  treason;  property 
menaced  with  partition;  assassination  studied  as  a  science  and 
practiced  as  an  art;  everywhere  powerful  secret  organizations 
sworn  to  demolish  the  social  fabric  that  the  slow  centuries  have 
but  just  erected  and  unmindful  that  themselves  will  perish  in 
the  wreck.  No  heart  in  Europe  can  beat  tranquilly  under 
clean  linen.  Such  is  the  gratitude,  such  is  the  wisdom,  such 
the  virtue  of  "The  Masses."  In  1 863  Alexander  II  of  Russia 
freed  25,000,000  serfs.  In  1879  they  had  killed  him  and  all 
joined  the  conspirators. 

That  ancient  and  various  device,  "a  republican  form  of  gov 
ernment,"  appears  to  be  too  good  for  all  the  peoples  of  the  earth 
excepting  one.  It  is  partly  successful  in  Switzerland ;  in  France 
and  America,  where  the  majority  is  composed  of  persons  hav 
ing  dark  understandings  and  criminal  instincts,  it  has  broken 
down.  In  our  case,  as  in  every  case,  the  momentum  of  suc 
cessful  revolution  carried  us  too  far.  We  rebelled  against 
tyranny  and  having  overthrown  it,  overthrew  also  the  govern 
mental  form  in  which  it  had  happened  to  be  manifest.  In 
their  anger  and  their  triumph  our  good  old  gran'thers  acted 

20 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial 


somewhat  in  the  spirit  of  the  Irishman  who  cudgeled  the  dead 
snake  until  nothing  was  left  of  it,  in  order  to  make  it  "sinsible 
of  its  desthruction."  They  meant  it  all,  too,  the  honest  souls! 
For  a  long  time  after  the  setting  up  of  the  republic  the  republic 
meant  active  hatred  to  kings,  nobles,  aristocracies.  It  was  held, 
and  rightly  held,  that  a  nobleman  could  not  breathe  in  America 
— that  he  left  his  title  and  his  privileges  on  the  ship  that  brought 
him  over.  Do  we  observe  anything  of  that  in  this  generation? 
On  the  landing  of  a  foreign  king,  prince  or  nobleman — even 
a  miserable  "knight" — do  we  not  execute  sycophantic  genu 
flexions?  Are  not  our  newspapers  full  of  flamboyant  descrip 
tions  and  qualming  adulation?  Nay,  does  not  our  President 
himself — successor  to  Washington  and  Jefferson! — greet  and 
entertain  the  "nation's  guest'*?  Is  not  every  American  young 
woman  crazy  to  mate  with  a  male  of  title?  Does  all  this  rep 
resent  no  retrogression? — is  it  not  the  backward  movement  of 
the  shadow  on  the  dial?  Doubtless  the  republican  idea  has 
struck  strong  roots  into  the  soil  of  the  two  Americas,  but  he 
who  rightly  considers  the  tendencies  of  events,  the  causes  that 
bring  them  about  and  the  consequences  that  flow  from  them, 
will  not  be  hot  to  affirm  the  perpetuity  of  republican  institutions 
in  the  Western  Hemisphere.  Between  their  inception  and  their 
present  stage  of  development  there  is  scarcely  the  beat  of  a 
pendulum;  and  already,  by  corruption  and  lawlessness,  the 
people  of  both  continents,  with  all  their  diversities  of  race  and 
character,  have  shown  themselves  about  equally  unfit.  To 
become  a  nation  of  scoundrels  all  that  any  people  needs  is 
opportunity,  and  what  we  are  pleased  to  call  by  the  impossible 
name  of  "self-government"  supplies  it. 

The  capital  defect  of  republican  government  is  inability  to 
repress  internal  forces  tending  to  disintegration.     It  does  not 

21 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

take  long  for  a  "self-governed"  people  to  learn  that  it  is  not 
really  governed — that  an  agreement  enforcible  by  nobody  but 
the  parties  to  it  is  not  binding.  We  are  learning  this  very 
rapidly:  we  set  aside  our  laws  whenever  we  please.  The 
sovereign  power — the  tribunal  of  ultimate  jurisdiction — is  a 
mob.  If  the  mob  is  large  enough  (it  need  not  be  very  large) , 
even  if  composed  of  vicious  tramps,  it  may  do  as  it  will.  It 
may  destroy  property  and  life.  It  may  without  proof  of  guilt 
inflict  upon  individuals  torments  unthinkable  by  fire  and  flay 
ing,  mutilations  that  are  nameless.  It  may  call  men,  women 
and  children  from  their  beds  and  beat  them  to  death  with 
cudgels.  In  the  light  of  day  it  may  assail  the  very  strongholds 
of  law  in  the  heart  of  a  populous  city,  and  assassinate  prisoners 
of  whose  guilt  it  knows  nothing.  And  these  things — observe, 
O  victims  of  kings — are  habitually  done.  One  would  as  well 
be  at  the  mercy  of  one's  sovereign  as  of  one's  neighbor. 

For  generations  we  have  been  charming  ourselves  with  the 
magic  of  words.  When  menaced  by  some  exceptionally 
monstrous  form  of  the  tyranny  of  numbers  we  have  closed  our 
eyes  and  murmured,  "Liberty."  When  armed  Anarchists 
threaten  to  quench  the  fires  of  civilization  in  a  sea  of  blood  we 
prate  of  the  protective  power  of  "free  speech."  If, 

"girt  about  by  friends  or  foes, 
A  man  may  speak  the  thing  he  will," 

we  fondly  fancy  that  the  thing  he  will  speak  is  harmless — that 
immunity  disarms  his  tongue  of  its  poison,  his  thought  of  its 
infection.  With  a  fatuity  that  would  be  incredible  without  the 
testimony  of  observation,  we  hold  that  an  Anarchist  free  to  go 
about  making  proselytes,  free  to  purchase  arms,  free  to  drill 
and  parade  and  encourage  his  dupes  with  a  demonstration  of 

22 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial 


their  numbers  and  power,  is  less  mischievous  than  an  Anarchist 
with  a  shut  mouth,  a  weaponless  hand  and  under  surveillance 
of  the  police.  The  Anarchist  himself  is  persuaded  of  the 
superiority  of  our  plan  of  dealing  with  him;  he  likes  it  and 
comes  over  in  quantity,  impesting  the  political  atmosphere  with 
the  "sweltered  venom"  engendered  by  centuries  of  oppression — 
comes  over  here,  where  he  is  not  oppressed,  and  sets  up  as  op 
pressor.  His  preferred  field  of  malefaction  is  the  country  that 
is  most  nearly  anarchical.  He  comes  here,  partly  to  better 
himself  under  our  milder  institutions,  partly  to  secure  immunity 
while  conspiring  to  destroy  them.  There  is  thunder  in  Europe, 
but  if  the  storm  ever  break  it  is  in  America  that  the  lightning 
will  fall,  for  here  is  a  great  vortex  into  which  the  decivilizing 
agencies  are  pouring  without  obstruction.  Here  gather  the 
eagles  to  the  feast,  for  the  quarry  is  defenceless.  Here  is  no 
power  in  government,  no  government.  Here  an  enemy  of  order 
is  thought  to  be  least  dangerous  when  suffered  to  preach  and 
arm  in  peace.  And  here  is  nothing  between  him  and  his  task 
of  supervision — no  pampered  soldiery  to  repress  his  rising,  no 
iron  authority  to  lay  him  by  the  heels.  The  militia  is  fraternal, 
the  magistracy  elective.  Europe  may  hold  out  a  little  longer. 
The  Great  Powers  may  make  what  stage-play  they  will,  but 
they  are  not  maintaining  their  incalculable  armaments  for 
aggression  upon  one  another,  for  protection  from  one  another, 
nor  for  fun.  These  vast  forces  are  purely  constabular — crea 
tures  and  creators  of  discontent — phenomena  of  decivilization. 
Eventually  they  will  fraternize  with  Disorder  or  become  them 
selves  Praetorian  Guards  more  dangerous  than  the  perils  that 
have  called  them  into  existence. 

It  is  easy  to  forecast  the  first  stages  of  the  End's  approach : 
Rioting.    Disaffection  of  constabulary  and  troops.    Subversion 

23 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

of  the  Government.  A  policy  of  decapitation.  Upthrust  of 
the  serviceable  Anarchist.  His  prompt  effacement  by  his  vic 
torious  ally  and  natural  enemy,  the  Socialist.  Free  minting  and 
printing  of  money — to  every  citizen  a  shoulder-load  of  the  lat 
ter,  to  the  printers  a  ton  each.  Divided  counsels.  Pande 
monium.  The  man  on  horseback.  Gusts  of  grape.  ? 

Formerly  the  bearer  of  evil  tidings  was  only  slain;  he  is 
now  ignored.  The  gods  kept  their  secrets  by  telling  them  to 
Cassandra,  whom  no  one  would  believe.  I  do  not  expect  to  be 
heeded.  The  crust  of  a  volcano  is  electric,  the  fumes  are  nar 
cotic;  the  combined  sensation  is  delightful  no  end.  I  have 
looked  at  the  dial  of  civilization ;  I  tell  you  the  shadow  is  going 
back.  That  is  of  small  importance  to  men  of  leisure,  with  wine- 
dipped  wreaths  upon  their  heads.  They  do  not  care  to  know 
the  hour. 


24 


Civilization 


Civilization 


I. 

| HE  question  "Does  civilization  civilize?"  is  a  fine 
example  of  petitio  principn,  and  decides  itself  in 
the  affirmative ;  for  civilization  must  needs  do  that 
from  the  doing  of  which  it  has  its  name.  But  it 
is  not  necessary  to  suppose  that  he  who  propounds  is  either 
unconscious  of  his  lapse  in  logic  or  desirous  of  digging  a  pitfall 
for  the  feet  of  those  who  discuss;  I  take  it  he  simply  wishes  to 
put  the  matter  in  an  impressive  way,  and  relies  upon  a  certain 
degree  of  intelligence  in  the  interpretation. 

Concerning  uncivilized  peoples  we  know  but  little  except 
what  we  are  told  by  travelers — who,  speaking  generally,  can 
know  very  little  but  the  fact  of  uncivilization  as  shown  in  ex 
ternals  and  irrelevances,  and  are  moreover,  greatly  given  to 
lying.  From  the  savages  we  hear  very  little.  Judging  them  in 
all  things  by  our  own  standards,  in  default  of  a  knowledge  of 
theirs,  we  necessarily  condemn,  disparage  and  belittle.  One 
thing  that  civilization  certainly  has  not  done  is  to  make  us  intel 
ligent  enough  to  understand  that  the  opposite  of  a  virtue  is  not 
necessarily  a  vice.  Because  we  do  not  like  the  taste  of  one 
another  it  does  not  follow  that  the  cannibal  is  a  person  of 
depraved  appetite.  Because,  as  a  rule,  we  have  but  one  wife 
and  several  mistresses  each  it  is  not  certain  that  polygamy  is 
everywhere — nor,  for  that  matter,  anywhere — either  wrong  or 
inexpedient.  Our  habit  of  wearing  clothes  does  not  prove  that 
conscience  of  the  body,  the  sense  of  shame,  is  charged  with 

27 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

a  divine  mandate;  for  like  the  conscience  of  the  spirit  it  is  the 
creature  of  what  it  seems  to  create:  it  comes  to  the  habit  of 
wearing  clothes.  And  for  those  who  hold  that  the  purpose  of 
civilization  is  morality  it  may  be  said  that  peoples  which  are 
the  most  nearly  naked  are,  in  our  sense,  the  most  nearly  moral. 
Because  the  brutality  of  the  civilized  slave  owners  and  dealers 
created  a  conquering  sentiment  against  slavery  it  is  not  intelli 
gent  to  assume  that  slavery  is  a  maleficent  thing  amongst 
Oriental  peoples  (for  example)  where  the  slave  is  not  op 
pressed.  Some  of  these  same  Orientals  whom  we  are  pleased 
to  term  half -civilized  have  no  regard  for  truth.  "Takest  thou 
me  for  a  Christian  dog,"  said  one  of  them,  "that  I  should  be  the 
slave  of  my  word?"  So  far  as  I  can  perceive  the  "Christian 
dog"  is  no  more  the  slave  of  his  word  than  the  True  Believer, 
and  I  think  the  savage — allowing  for  the  fact  that  his  inveracity 
has  dominion  over  fewer  things — as  great  a  liar  as  either  of 
them.  For  my  part,  I  do  not  know  what,  in  all  circumstances, 
is  right  or  wrong;  but  I  know,  if  right,  it  is  at  least  stupid  to 
judge  an  uncivilized  people  by  the  standards  of  morality  and 
intelligence  set  up  by  civilized  ones.  An  infinitesimal  propor 
tion  of  civilized  men  do  not,  and  there  is  much  to  be  said  for 
civilization  if  they  are  the  product  of  it. 

Life  in  civilized  countries  is  so  complex  that  men  there  have 
more  ways  to  be  good  than  savages  have,  and  more  to  be  bad ; 
more  to  be  happy,  and  more  to  be  miserable.  And  in  each 
way  to  be  good  or  bad,  their  generally  superior  knowledge — 
their  knowledge  of  more  things — enables  them  to  commit 
greater  excesses  than  the  savage  could  with  the  same  oppor 
tunity.  The  civilized  philanthropist  wreaks  upon  his  fellow 
creatures  a  ranker  philanthropy,  the  civilized  scoundrel  a 
sturdier  rascality.  And — splendid  triumph  of  enlightenment! 

28 


Civilization 


— the  two  characters  are,  in  civilization,  commonly  combined 
in  one  person. 

I  know  of  no  savage  custom  or  habit  of  thought  which  has 
not  its  mate  in  civilized  countries.  For  every  mischievous  or 
absurd  practice  of  the  natural  man  I  can  name  you  a  dozen  of 
the  unnatural  which  are  essentially  the  same.  And  nearly 
every  custom  of  our  barbarian  ancestors  in  historic  times  sur 
vives  in  some  form  today.  We  make  ourselves  look  formidable 
in  battle — for  that  matter,  we  fight.  Our  women  paint  their 
faces.  We  feel  it  obligatory  to  dress  more  or  less  alike,  invent 
ing  the  most  ingenious  reasons  for  it  and  actually  despising  and 
persecuting  those  who  do  not  care  to  conform.  Within  the 
memory  of  living  persons  bearded  men  were  stoned  in  the 
streets;  and  a  clergyman  in  New  York  who  wore  his  beard  as 
Christ  wore  his,  was  put  into  jail  and  variously  persecuted  till 
he  died.  We  bury  our  dead  instead  of  burning  them,  yet  every 
cemetery  is  set  thick  with  urns.  As  there  are  no  ashes  for  the 
urns  we  do  not  trouble  ourselves  to  make  them  hollow,  and  we 
say  their  use  is  "emblematic."  When,  following  the  bent  of 
our  ancestral  instincts,  we  go  on,  age  after  age,  in  the  perform 
ance  of  some  senseless  act  which  once  had  a  use  and  meaning 
we  excuse  ourselves  by  calling  it  symbolism.  Our  "symbols" 
are  merely  survivals.  We  have  theology  and  patriotism.  We 
have  all  the  savage's  superstition.  We  propitiate  and  ingratiate 
by  means  of  gifts.  We  shake  hands.  All  these  and  hundreds 
of  others  of  our  practices  are  distinctly,  in  their  nature  and  by 
their  origin,  savage. 

Civilization  does  not,  I  think,  make  the  race  any  better. 
It  makes  men  know  more :  and  if  knowledge  makes  them  happy 
it  is  useful  and  desirable.  The  one  purpose  of  every  sane 
human  being  is  to  be  happy.  No  one  can  have  any  other 

29 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

motive  than  that.  There  is  no  such  thing  as  unselfishness.  We 
perform  the  most  "generous"  and  "self-sacrificing**  acts  because 
we  should  be  unhappy  if  we  did  not.  We  move  on  lines  of  least 
reluctance.  Whatever  tends  to  increase  the  beggarly  sum  of 
human  happiness  is  worth  having;  nothing  else  has  any  value. 

The  cant  of  civilization  fatigues.  Civilization  is  a  fine  and 
beautiful  structure.  It  is  as  picturesque  as  a  Gothic  cathedral. 
But  it  is  built  upon  the  bones  and  cemented  with  the  blood  of 
those  whose  part  in  all  its  pomp  is  that  and  nothing  more.  It 
cannot  be  reared  in  the  generous  tropics,  for  there  the  people 
will  not  contribute  their  blood  and  bones.  The  proposition 
that  the  average  American  workingman  or  European  peasant 
is  "better  off**  than  the  South  Sea  Islander,  lolling  under  a  palm 
and  drunk  with  over-eating,  will  not  bear  a  moment's  examina 
tion.  It  is  we  scholars  and  gentlemen  that  are  better  off. 

It  is  admitted  that  the  South  Sea  Islander  in  a  state  of 
nature  is  overmuch  addicted  to  the  practice  of  eating  human 
flesh;  but  concerning  that  I  submit:  first,  that  he  likes  it;  sec 
ond,  that  those  who  supply  it  are  mostly  dead.  It  is  upon  his 
enemies  that  he  feeds,  and  these  he  would  kill  anyhow,  as  we 
do  ours.  In  civilized,  enlightened  and  Christian  countries, 
where  cannibalism  has  not  yet  established  itself,  wars  are  as 
frequent  and  destructive  as  among  the  maneaters.  The  un- 
titled  savage  knows  at  least  why  he  goes  killing,  whereas  the 
private  soldier  is  commonly  in  black  ignorance  of  the  apparent 
cause  of  quarrel — of  the  actual  cause,  always.  Their  shares 
in  the  fruits  of  victory  are  about  equal :  the  Chief  takes  all  the 
dead,  the  General  all  the  glory.  Moreover  it  costs  more  human 
life  to  supply  a  Christian  gentleman  with  food  than  it  does  a 
cannibal — with  food  alone:  "board;**  if  you  could  figure  out 
the  number  of  lives  that  his  lodging,  clothing,  amusements  and 

30 


Civilization 


accomplishments  cost  the  sum  would  startle.  Happily  he  does 
not  pay  it.  Considering  human  lives  as  having  value,  canni 
balism  is  undoubtedly  the  more  economical  system. 

II. 

Transplanted  institutions  grow  but  slowly;  and  civiliza 
tion  can  not  be  put  into  a  ship  and  carried  across  an  ocean. 
The  history  of  this  country  is  a  sequence  of  illustrations  of  these 
truths.  It  was  settled  by  civilized  men  and  women  from  civil 
ized  countries,  yet  after  two  and  a  half  centuries  with  un 
broken  communication  with  the  mother  systems,  it  is  still  im 
perfectly  civilized.  In  learning  and  letters,  in  art  and  the 
science  of  government,  America  is  but  a  faint  and  stammering 
echo  of  England. 

For  nearly  all  that  is  good  in  our  American  civilization  we 
are  indebted  to  England;  the  errors  and  mischiefs  are  of  our 
own  creation.  We  have  originated  little,  because  there  is 
little  to  originate,  but  we  have  unconsciously  reproduced  many 
of  the  discredited  and  abandoned  systems  of  former  ages  and 
other  countries — receiving  them  at  second  hand,  but  making 
them  ours  by  the  sheer  strength  and  immobility  of  the  national 
belief  in  their  newness.  Newness!  Why,  it  is  not  possible 
to  make  an  experiment  in  government,  in  art,  in  literature,  in 
sociology,  or  in  morals,  that  has  not  been  made  over,  and  over, 
and  over  again.  Fools  talk  of  clear  and  simple  remedies  for 
this  and  that  evil  afflicting  the  commonwealth.  If  a  proposed 
remedy  is  obvious  and  easily  intelligible,  it  is  condemned  in 
the  naming,  for  it  is  morally  certain  to  have  been  tried  a  thou 
sand  times  in  the  history  of  the  world,  and  had  it  been  effective 
men  ere  now  would  have  forgotten,  from  mere  disuse,  how  to 
produce  the  evil  it  cured. 

31 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

There  are  clear  and  simple  remedies  for  nothing.  In  medi 
cine  there  has  been  discovered  but  a  single  specific;  in  politics 
not  one.  The  interests,  moral  and  natural,  of  a  community  in 
our  highly  differentiated  civilization  are  so  complex,  intricate, 
delicate  and  interdependent,  that  you  can  not  touch  one  with 
out  affecting  all.  It  is  a  familiar  truth  that  no  law  was  ever 
passed  that  did  not  have  unforeseen  results ;  but  of  these  results, 
by  far  the  greater  number  are  never  recognized  as  of  its  creation. 
The  best  that  can  be  said  of  any  "measure"  is,  that  the  sum  of  its 
perceptible  benefits  seems  so  to  exceed  the  sum  of  its  perceptible 
evils  as  to  constitute  a  balance  of  advantage.  Yet  the  mag 
nificent  innocence  of  the  statesman  or  philosopher  to  whose 
understanding  "the  whole  matter  lies  in  a  nutshell" — who  thinks 
he  can  formulate  a  practical  political  or  social  policy  within  the 
four  corners  of  an  epigram — who  fears  nothing  because  he 
knows  nothing — is  constantly  to  the  fore  with  a  simple  specific 
for  ills  whose  causes  are  complex,  constant  and  inscrutable. 
To  the  understanding  of  this  creature  a  difficulty  well  ignored 
is  half  overcome;  so  he  buttons  up  his  eyes  and  assails  the 
problems  of  life  with  the  divine  confidence  of  a  blind  pig 
traversing  a  labyrinth. 

The  glories  of  England  are  our  glories.  She  can  achieve 
nothing  that  our  fathers  did  not  help  to  make  possible  to  her. 
The  learning,  the  power,  the  refinement  of  a  great  nation,  are 
not  the  growth  of  a  century,  but  of  many  centuries;  each  gen 
eration  builds  upon  the  work  of  the  preceding.  For  untold 
ages  our  ancestors  wrought  to  rear  that  "revered  pile,"  the 
civilization  of  England.  And  shall  we  now  try  to  belittle  the 
mighty  structure  because  other  though  kindred  hands  are  laying 
the  top  courses  while  we  have  elected  to  found  a  new  tower  in 
another  land?  The  American  eulogist  of  civilization  who  is 

32 


Civilization 


not  proud  of  his  heritage  in  England's  glory  is  unworthy  to 
enjoy  his  lesser  heritage  in  the  lesser  glory  of  his  own  country. 

The  English  are  undoubtedly  our  intellectual  superiors; 
and  as  the  virtues  are  solely  the  product  of  education — a  rogue 
being  only  a  dunce  considered  from  another  point  of  view — 
they  are  our  moral  superiors  likewise.  Why  should  they  not  be  ? 
It  is  a  land  not  of  log  and  pine-board  schoolhouses  grudgingly 
erected  and  containing  schools  supported  by  such  niggardly 
tax  levies  as  a  sparse  and  hard-handed  population  will  consent 
to  pay,  but  of  ancient  institutions  splendidly  endowed  by  the 
State  and  by  centuries  of  private  benefaction.  As  a  means  of 
dispensing  formulated  ignorance  our  boasted  public  school 
system  is  not  without  merit;  it  spreads  it  out  sufficiently  thin  to 
give  everyone  enough  to  make  him  a  more  competent  fool  than 
he  would  have  been  without  it;  but  to  compare  it  with  that 
which  is  not  the  creature  of  legislation  acting  with  malice  afore 
thought,  but  the  unnoted  outgrowth  of  ages,  is  to  be  ridiculous. 
It  is  like  comparing  the  laid-out  town  of  a  western  prairie,  its 
right-angled  streets,  prim  cottages,  "built  on  the  installment 
plan,"  and  its  wooden  a-b-c  shops,  with  the  grand  old  town  of 
Oxford,  topped  with  the  clustered  domes  and  towers  of  its 
twenty-odd  great  colleges,  the  very  names  of  many  of  whose 
founders  have  perished  from  human  record  as  have  all  the 
chronicles  of  the  times  in  which  they  lived. 

It  is  not  alone  that  we  have  had  to  "subdue  the  wilder 
ness;"  our  educational  conditions  are  otherwise  adverse.  Our 
political  system  is  unfavorable.  Our  fortunes,  accumulated  in 
one  generation,  are  dispersed  in  the  next.  If  it  takes  three  gen 
erations  to  make  a  gentleman  one  will  not  make  a  thinker.  In 
struction  is  acquired,  but  capacity  for  instruction  is  transmitted. 
The  brain  that  is  to  contain  a  trained  intellect  is  not  the  result 

33 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

of  a  haphazard  marriage  between  a  clown  and  a  wench,  nor 
does  it  get  its  tractable  tissues  from  a  hard-headed  farmer  and  a 
soft-headed  milliner.  If  you  confess  the  importance  of  race  and 
pedigree  in  a  race  horse  and  a  bird  dog  how  dare  you  deny  it 
in  a  man  ? 

I  do  not  claim  that  the  political  and  social  system  that 
creates  an  aristocracy  of  leisure,  and  consequently  of  intellect, 
is  the  best  possible  kind  of  human  organization;  I  perceive  its 
disadvantages  clearly  enough.  But  I  do  not  hold  that  a  sys 
tem  under  which  all  important  public  trusts,  political  and  pro 
fessional,  civil  and  military,  ecclesiastical  and  secular,  are  held 
by  educated  men — that  is,  men  of  trained  faculties  and  dis 
ciplined  judgment — is  not  an  altogether  faulty  system. 

It  is  only  in  our  own  country  that  an  exacting  literary  taste 
is  believed  to  disqualify  a  man  for  purveying  to  the  literary 
needs  of  a  taste  less  exacting — a  proposition  obviously  absurd, 
for  an  exacting  taste  is  nothing  but  the  intelligent  discrimination 
of  a  judgment  instructed  by  comparison  and  observation.  There 
is,  in  fact,  no  pursuit  or  occupation,  from  that  of  a  man  who 
blows  up  a  balloon  to  that  of  the  man  who  bores  out  the  stove 
pipes,  in  which  he  that  has  talent  and  education  is  not  a  better 
worker  than  he  that  has  either,  and  he  than  he  that  has  neither. 
It  is  a  universal  human  weakness  to  disparage  the  knowledge 
that  we  do  not  ourselves  possess,  but  it  is  only  my  own  beloved 
country  that  can  justly  boast  herself  the  last  refuge  and  asylum 
of  the  impotents  and  incapables  who  deny  the  advantage  of  all 
knowledge  whatsoever.  It  was  an  American  Senator  (Logan) 
who  declared  that  he  had  devoted  a  couple  of  weeks  to  the 
study  of  finance,  and  found  the  accepted  authorities  all  wrong. 
It  was  another  American  Senator  (Morton)  who,  confronted 
with  certain  ugly  facts  in  the  history  of  another  country,  pro- 

34 


Civilization 


posed  "to  brush  away  all  facts,  and  argue  the  question  on  con 
siderations  of  plain  common  sense." 

Republican  institutions  have  this  disadvantage :  by  incessant 
changes  in  the  personnel  of  government — to  say  nothing  of  the 
manner  of  men  that  ignorant  constituencies  elect;  and  all  con 
stituencies  are  ignorant — we  attain  to  no  fixed  principles  and 
standards.  There  is  no  such  thing  here  as  a  science  of  politics, 
because  it  is  not  to  any  one's  interest  to  make  politics  the  study 
of  his  life.  Nothing  is  settled;  no  truth  finds  general  accept 
ance.  What  we  do  one  year  we  undo  the  next,  and  do  over 
again  the  year  following.  Our  energy  is  wasted  in,  and  our 
prosperity  suffers  from,  experiments  endlessly  repeated. 

One  of  the  disadvantages  of  our  social  system,  which  is  the 
child  of  our  political,  is  the  tyranny  of  public  opinion,  for 
bidding  the  utterance  of  wholesome  but  unpalatable  truth.  In 
a  republic  we  are  so  accustomed  to  the  rule  of  majorities  that  it 
seldom  occurs  to  us  to  examine  their  title  to  dominion;  and  as 
the  ideas  of  might  and  right  are,  by  our  innate  sense  of  justice, 
linked  together,  we  come  to  consider  public  opinion  infallible 
and  almost  sacred.  Now,  majorities  rule,  not  because  they  are 
right,  but  because  they  are  able  to  rule.  In  event  of  collision 
they  would  conquer,  so  it  is  expedient  for  minorities  to  submit 
beforehand  to  save  trouble.  In  fact,  majorities,  embracing,  as 
they  do  the  most  ignorant,  seldom  think  rightly ;  public  opinion, 
being  the  opinion  of  mediocrity,  is  commonly  a  mistake  and  a 
mischief.  But  it  is  to  nobody's  interest — it  is  against  the  inter 
est  of  most — to  dispute  with  it.  Public  writer  and  public 
speaker  alike  find  their  account  in  confirming  "the  plain  people" 
in  their  brainless  errors  and  brutish  prejudices — in  glutting  their 
omnivorous  vanity  and  inflaming  their  implacable  racial  and 
national  hatreds. 

35 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

I  have  long  held  the  opinion  that  patriotism  is  one  of  the 
most  abominable  vices  affecting  the  human  understanding. 
Every  patriot  in  this  world  believes  his  country  better  than  any 
other  country.  Now,  they  cannot  all  be  the  best ;  indeed,  only 
one  can  be  the  best,  and  it  follows  that  the  patriots  of  all  the 
others  have  suffered  themselves  to  be  misled  by  a  mere  senti 
ment  into  blind  unreason.  In  its  active  manifestation — it  is  fond 
of  shooting — patriotism  would  be  well  enough  if  it  were  simply 
defensive;  but  it  is  also  aggressive,  and  the  same  feeling  that 
prompts  us  to  strike  for  our  altars  and  our  fires  impels  us  like 
wise  to  go  over  the  border  to  quench  the  fires  and  overturn  the 
altars  of  our  neighbors.  It  is  all  very  pretty  and  spirited,  what 
the  poets  tell  us  about  Thermopylae,  but  there  was  as  much 
patriotism  at  one  end  of  that  pass  as  there  was  at  the  other. 

Patriotism  deliberately  and  with  folly  aforethought  sub 
ordinates  the  interests  of  a  whole  to  the  interests  of  a  part. 
Worse  still,  the  fraction  so  favored  is  determined  by  an 
accident  of  birth  or  residence.  Patriotism  is  like  a  dog  which, 
having  entered  at  random  one  of  a  row  of  kennels,  suffers  more 
in  combats  with  the  dogs  in  the  other  kennels  than  it  would 
have  done  by  sleeping  in  the  open  air.  The  hoodlum  who  cuts 
the  tail  from  a  Chinamen's  nowl,  and  would  cut  the  nowl 
from  the  body  if  he  dared,  is  simply  a  patriot  with  a  logical 
mind,  having  the  courage  of  his  opinions.  Patriotism  is  fierce 
as  a  fever,  pitiless  as  the  grave,  blind  as  a  stone  and  irrational 
as  a  headless  hen. 

III. 

There  are  two  ways  of  clarifying  liquids — ebullition  and 
precipitation;  one  forces  the  impurities  to  the  surface  as  scum, 
the  other  sends  them  to  the  bottom  as  dregs.  The  former  is  the 

36 


Civilization 


more  offensive,  and  that  seems  to  be  our  way;  but  neither  is 
useful  if  the  impurities  are  merely  separated  but  not  removed. 
We  are  told  with  tiresome  iteration  that  our  social  and  political 
systems  are  clarifying;  but  when  is  the  skimmer  to  appear? 
If  the  purpose  of  free  institutions  is  good  government  where  is 
the  good  government? — when  may  it  be  expected  to  begin? — 
how  is  it  to  come  about?  Systems  of  government  have  no  sanc 
tity  ;  they  are  practical  means  to  a  simple  end — the  public  wel 
fare;  worthy  of  no  respect  if  they  fail  of  its  accomplishment. 
The  tree  is  known  by  its  fruit.  Ours  is  bearing  crab-apples.  If 
the  body  politic  is  constitutionally  diseased,  as  I  verily  believe ; 
if  the  disorder  inheres  in  the  system;  there  is  no  remedy.  The 
fever  must  burn  itself  out,  and  then  Nature  will  do  the  rest. 
One  does  not  prescribe  what  time  alone  can  administer.  We 
have  put  our  criminal  class  in  power;  do  we  suppose  they  will 
efface  themselves?  Will  they  restore  to  us  the  power  of  gov 
erning  them?  They  must  have  their  way  and  go  their  length. 
The  natural  and  immemorial  sequence  is :  tyranny,  insurrection, 
combat.  In  combat  everything  that  wears  a  sword  has  a 
chance — even  the  right.  History  does  not  forbid  us  to  hope. 
But  it  forbids  us  to  rely  upon  numbers;  they  will  be  against 
us.  If  history  teaches  anything  worth  learning  it  teaches  that 
the  majority  of  mankind  is  neither  good  nor  wise.  Where 
government  is  founded  upon  the  public  conscience  and  the 
public  intelligence  the  stability  of  States  is  a  dream.  Nor  have 
we  any  warrant  for  the  Tennysonian  faith  that 

"Freedom   broadens   slowly   down 
From  precedent  to  precedent." 

In  that  moment  of  time  that  is  covered  by  historical  records 
we  have  abundant  evidence  that  each  generation  has  believed 

37 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

itself  wiser  and  better  than  any  of  its  predecessors;  that  each 
people  has  believed  itself  to  have  the  secret  of  national  per 
petuity.  In  support  of  this  universal  delusion  there  is  nothing 
to  be  said;  the  desolate  places  of  the  earth  cry  out  against 
it.  Vestiges  of  obliterated  civilizations  cover  the  earth;  no 
savage  but  has  camped  upon  the  sites  of  proud  and  popu 
lous  cities;  no  desert  but  has  heard  the  statesman's  boast  of 
national  stability.  Our  nation,  our  laws,  our  history — all 
shall  go  down  to  everlasting  oblivion  with  the  others,  and  by 
the  same  road.  But  I  submit  that  we  are  traveling  it  with 
needless  haste. 

But  it  is  all  right  and  righteous.  It  can  be  spared — this 
Jonah's  gourd  civilization  of  ours.  We  have  hardly  the  rudi 
ments  of  a  true  civilization;  compared  with  the  splendors  of 
which  we  catch  dim  glimpses  in  the  fading  past,  ours  are  as 
an  illumination  of  tallow  candles.  We  know  no  more  than 
the  ancients;  we  only  know  other  things,  but  nothing  in  which 
is  an  assurance  of  perpetuity,  and  little  that  is  truly  wisdom. 
Our  vaunted  elixir  vitcs  is  the  art  of  printing  with  moveable 
types.  What  good  will  those  do  when  posterity,  struck  by  the 
inevitable  intellectual  blight,  shall  have  ceased  to  read  what  is 
printed?  Our  libraries  will  become  its  stables,  our  books  its 
fuel. 

Ours  is  a  civilization  that  might  be  heard  from  afar  in 
space  as  a  scolding  and  a  riot;  a  civilization  in  which  the  race 
has  so  differentiated  as  to  have  no  longer  a  community  of 
interest  and  feeling;  which  shows  as  a  ripe  result  of  the  princi 
ples  underlying  it  a  reasonless  and  rascally  feud  between  rich 
and  poor;  in  which  one  is  offered  a  choice  (if  one  have  the 
means  to  take  it)  between  American  plutocracy  and  European 
militocracy,  with  an  imminent  chance  of  renouncing  either  for  a 

38 


Civilization 


stultocratic  republic  with  a  headsman  in  the  presidential  chair 
and  every  laundress  in  exile. 

I  have  not  a  "solution"  to  the  "labor  problem."  I  have 
only  a  story.  Many  and  many  years  ago  lived  a  man  who 
was  so  good  and  wise  that  none  in  all  the  world  was  so  good 
and  wise  as  he.  He  was  one  of  those  few  whose  goodness 
and  wisdom  are  such  that  after  some  time  has  passed  their 
fellowmen  begin  to  think  them  gods  and  treasure  their  words  as 
divine  law;  and  by  millions  they  are  worshiped  through 
centuries  of  time.  Amongst  the  utterances  of  this  man  was 
one  command — not  a  new  nor  perfect  one — which  has  seemed 
to  his  adorers  so  preeminently  wise  that  they  have  given  it  a 
name  by  which  it  is  known  over  half  the  world.  One  of  the 
sovereign  virtues  of  this  famous  law  is  its  simplicity,  which 
is  such  that  all  hearing  must  understand;  and  obedience  is  so 
easy  that  any  nation  refusing  is  unfit  to  exist  except  in  the  turb 
ulence  and  adversity  that  will  surely  come  to  it.  When  a 
people  would  avert  want  and  strife,  or,  having  them,  would 
restore  plenty  and  peace,  this  noble  commandment  offers  the 
only  means — all  other  plans  for  safety  or  relief  are  as  vain 
as  dreams,  and  as  empty  as  the  crooning  of  fools.  And  be 
hold,  here  it  is:  "All  things  whatsoever  ye  would  that  men 
should  do  to  you,  do  ye  even  so  to  them." 

What!  you  unappeasable  rich,  coining  the  sweat  and 
blood  of  your  workmen  into  drachmas,  understanding  the  law 
of  supply  and  demand  as  mandatory  and  justifying  your  cruel 
greed  by  the  senseless  dictum  that  "business  is  business;"  you 
lazy  workman,  railing  at  the  capitalist  by  whose  desertion, 
when  you  have  frightened  away  his  capital,  you  starve — riot 
ing  and  shedding  blood  and  torturing  and  poisoning  by  way 
of  answer  to  exaction  and  by  way  of  exaction;  you  foul 

39 


The  Shadow   on   the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

anarchists,  applauding  with  indelicate  palms  when  one  of 
your  coward  kind  hurls  a  bomb  amongst  powerless  and  help 
less  women  and  children ;  you  imbecile  politicians  with  a  plague 
of  remedial  legislation  for  the  irremediable;  you  writers  and 
thinkers  unread  in  history,  with  as  many  "solutions  to  the 
labor  problem"  as  there  are  dunces  among  you  who  can  not 
coherently  define  it — do  you  really  think  yourself  wiser  than 
Jesus  of  Nazareth?  Do  you  seriously  suppose  yourselves 
competent  to  amend  his  plan  for  dealing  with  all  the  evils 
besetting  states  and  souls?  Have  you  the  effrontery  to  believe 
that  those  who  spurn  his  Golden  Rule  you  can  bind  to  obed 
ience  of  an  act  entitled  an  act  to  amend  an  act?  Bah!  you 
fatigue  the  spirit.  Go  get  ye  to  your  scoundrel  lockouts,  your 
villain  strikes,  your  blacklisting,  your  boycotting,  your  speech- 
ing,  marching  and  maundering;  but  if  ye  do  not  to  others  as 
ye  would  that  they  do  to  you  it  shall  occur,  and  that  right 
soon,  that  ye  be  drowned  in  your  own  blood  and  your  pick 
pocket  civilization  quenched  as  a  star  that  falls  into  the  sea. 


The  Game 
of  Politics 


The  Came  of  Politics 


i. 

F  ONE  were  to  declare  himself  a  Democrat  or  a 
Republican  and  the  claim  should  be  contested  he 
would  find  it  a  difficult  one  to  prove.  The  missing 
link  in  his  chain  of  evidence  would  be  the  major 
premise  in  the  syllogism  necessary  to  the  establishment  of  his 
political  status — a  definition  of  "Democrat"  or  "Republican." 
Most  of  the  statesmen  in  public  and  private  life  who  are  poll- 
parroting  these  words,  do  so  with  entire  unconsciousness  of  their 
meaning,  or  rather  without  knowledge  that  they  have  lost 
whatever  of  meaning  they  once  had.  The  words  are  mere 
"survivals,"  marking  dead  issues  and  covering  allegiances  of 
the  loosest  and  most  shallow  character.  On  any  question  of 
importance  each  party  is  divided  against  itself  and  dares  not 
formulate  a  preference.  There  is  no  question  before  the 
country  upon  which  one  may  not  think  and  vote  as  he  likes 
without  affecting  his  standing  in  the  political  communion  of 
saints  of  which  he  professes  himself  a  member.  "Party  lines" 
are  as  terribly  confused  as  the  parallels  of  latitude  and  longi 
tude  after  a  twisting  earthquake,  or  those  aimless  lines  repre 
senting  the  competing  railroad  on  a  map  published  by  a  com 
pany  operating  "the  only  direct  route."  It  is  not  probable  that 
this  state  of  things  can  last;  if  there  is  to  be  "government  by 
party" — and  we  should  be  sad  to  think  that  so  inestimable  a 
boon  were  soon  to  return  to  Him  who  gave  it — men  must  begin 
to  let  their  angry  passions  rise  and  take  sides.  "Ill  fares  the 
land  to  hastening  ills  a  prey,"  where  the  people  are  too  wise 

43 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

to  dispute  and  too  good  to  fight.  Let  us  have  the  good  old 
political  currency  of  bloody  noses  and  cracked  crowns;  let  the 
yawp  of  the  demagogue  be  heard  in  the  land;  let  ears  be  pes 
tered  with  the  spargent  cheers  of  the  masses.  Give  us  a  whoop- 
up  that  shall  rouse  us  like  a  rattling  peal  of  thunder.  Will 
nobody  be  our  Moses — there  should  be  two  Moseses — to 
lead  us  through  this  detestable  wilderness  of  political  stag 
nation  ? 

n. 

Nowhere  "on  God's  green  earth" — it  is  fitting,  that  this 
paper  contain  a  bit  of  bosh — nowhere  is  so  much  insufferable 
stuff  talked  in  a  given  period  of  time  as  in  an  American  political 
convention.  It  is  there  that  all  those  objectionable  elements  of 
the  national  character  which  evoke  the  laughter  of  Europe  and 
are  the  despair  of  our  friends  find  freest  expression,  unhampered 
by  fear  of  any  censorship  more  exacting  than  that  of  "the 
opposing  party" — which  takes  no  account  of  intellectual 
delinquencies,  but  only  of  moral.  The  "organs"  of  the  "oppos 
ing  party"  will  not  take  the  trouble  to  point  out — even  to 
observe — that  the  "debasing  sentiments"  and  "criminal  views" 
uttered  in  speech  and  platform  are  expressed  in  sickening 
syntax  and  offensive  rhetoric.  Doubtless  an  American  poli 
tician,  statesman,  what  you  will,  could  go  into  a  political  con 
vention  and  signify  his  views  with  simple,  unpretentious  com 
mon  sense,  but  doubtless  he  never  does. 

Every  community  is  cursed  with  a  number  of  "orators" — 
men  regarded  as  "eloquent" — "silver  tongued"  men — fellows 
who  to  the  common  American  knack  at  brandishing  the  tongue 
add  an  exceptional  felicity  of  platitude,  a  captivating  mastery 
of  dog's-eared  sentiment,  a  copious  and  obedient  vocabulary  of 

44 


The  Came  of  Politics 


eulogium,  an  iron  insensibility  to  the  ridiculous  and  an  infinite 
affinity  to  fools.  These  afflicting  Chrysostoms  are  always  lying 
in  wait  for  an  "occasion."  It  matters  not  what  it  is:  a  "recep 
tion"  to  some  great  man  from  abroad,  a  popular  ceremony 
like  the  laying  of  a  corner-stone,  the  opening  of  a  fair,  the 
dedication  of  a  public  building,  an  anniversary  banquet  of  an 
ancient  and  honorable  order  (they  all  belong  to  ancient  and 
honorable  orders)  ojr  a  club  dinner — they  all  belong  to  clubs 
and  pay  dues.  But  it  is  in  the  political  convention  that  they 
come  out  particularly  strong.  By  some  imperious  tradition 
having  the  force  of  written  law  it  is  decreed  that  in  these 
absurd  bodies  of  our  fellow  citizens  no  word  of  sense  shall  be 
uttered  from  the  platform;  whatever  is  uttered  in  set  speeches 
shall  be  addressed  to  the  meanest  capacity  present.  As  a 
chain  can  be  no  stronger  than  its  weakest  link,  so  nothing  said 
by  the  speakers  at  a  political  convention  must  be  above  the 
intellectual  reach  of  the  most  pernicious  idiot  having  a  seat 
and  a  vote.  I  don't  know  why  it  is  so.  It  seems  to  be  thought 
that  if  he  is  not  suitably  entertained  he  will  not  attend,  as  a 
delegate,  the  next  convention. 

Here  are  the  opening  sentences  of  the  speech  in  which  a 
man  was  once  nominated  for  Governor: 

"Two  years  ago  the  Republican  party  in  State  and  Nation 
marched  to  imperial  triumph.  On  every  hilltop  and  mountain 
peak  our  beacons  blazed  and  we  awakened  the  echoes  of 
every  valley  with  songs  of  our  rejoicings." 

And  so  forth.  Now,  if  I  were  asked  to  recast  those 
sentences  so  that  they  should  conform  to  the  simple  truth  and 
be  inoffensive  to  good  taste  I  should  say  something  like  this: 

"Two  years  ago  the  Republican  party  won  a  general 
election." 

45 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

If  there  is  any  thing. in  this  inflated  rigmarole  that  is  not 
adequately  expressed  in  my  amended  statement,  what  is  it? 
As  to  eloquence  it  will  hardly  be  argued  that  nonsense,  false 
hood  and  metaphors  which  were  old  when  Rome  was  young 
are  essential  to  that.  The  first  man  (in  early  Greece)  who 
spoke  of  awakening  an  echo  did  a  felicitous  thing.  Was  it 
felicitous  in  the  second?  Is  it  felicitous  now?  As  to  that 
military  metaphor — the  "marching**  and  so  forth — its  inventor 
was  as  great  an  ass  as  any  one  of  the  incalculable  multitude 
of  his  plagiarists.  On  this  matter  hear  the  late  Richard 
Grant  White: 

"Is  it  not  time  that  we  had  done  with  the  nauseous  talk 
about  campaigns,  and  standard-bearers,  and  glorious  victories 
(imperial  triumphs)  and  all  the  bloated  army-bumming  bom 
bast  which  is  so  rife  for  the  six  months  preceding  an  election? 
To  read  almost  any  one  of  our  political  papers  during  a  canvass 
is  enough  to  make  one  sick  and  sorry.  .  .  .  An  election 
has  no  manner  of  likeness  to  a  campaign,  or  a  battle.  It  is 
not  even  a  contest  in  which  the  stronger  or  more  dexterous  party 
is  the  winner ;  it  is  a  mere  counting,  in  which  the  bare  fact  that 
one  party  is  the  more  numerous  puts  it  in  power  if  it  will  only 
come  up  and  be  counted ;  to  insure  which  a  certain  time  is  spent 
by  each  party  in  reviling  and  belittling  the  candidates  of  its 
opponents  and  lauding  its  own;  and  this  is  the  canvass,  at  the 
likening  of  which  to  a  campaign  every  honest  soldier  might 
reasonably  take  offense." 

But,  after  all,  White  was  only  "one  o'  them  dam  litery 
fellers,"  and  I  dare  say  the  original  proponent  of  the  military 
metaphor,  away  off  there  in  "the  dark  backward  and  abysm 
of  time,"  knew  a  lot  more  about  practical  politics  than  White 
ever  did.  And  it  is  practical  politics  to  be  an  ass. 

46 


The  Came  of  Politics 


In  withdrawing  his  own  name  from  before  a  convention,  a 
California  politician  once  made  a  purely  military  speech  of 
which  a  single  sample  passage  is  all  that  I  shall  allow  myself  the 
happiness  to  quote : 

"I  come  before  you  today  as  a  Republican  of  the  Repub 
lican  banner  county  of  this  great  State  of  ours.  From  snowy 
Shasta  on  the  north  to  sunny  Diego  on  the  south ;  from  the  west, 
where  the  waves  of  the  Pacific  look  upon  our  shores,  to  where 
the  barriers  of  the  great  Sierras  stand  clad  in  eternal  snow, 
there  is  no  more  loyal  county  to  the  Republican  party  in  this 
State  than  the  county  from  which  I  hail.  [Applause, 
naturally.]  Its  loyalty  to  the  party  has  been  tested  on  many 
fields  of  battle  [Anglice,  in  many  elections]  and  it  has  never 
wavered  in  the  contest.  Wherever  the  fate  of  battle  was 
trembling  in  the  balance  [Homer,  and  since  Homer,  Tom, 
Dick  and  Harry]  Alameda  county  stepped  into  the  breach 
and  rescued  the  Republican  party  from  defeat." 

Translated  into  English  this  military  mouthing  would  read 
somewhat  like  this: 

"I  live  in  Alameda  county,  where  the  Republicans  have 
uniformly  outvoted  the  Democrats." 

The  orators  at  the  Democratic  convention  a  week  earlier 
were  no  better  and  no  different.  Their  rhetorical  stock-in-trade 
was  the  same  old  shop-worn  figures  of  speech  in  which  their 
predecessors  have  dealt  for  ages,  and  in  which  their  successors 
will  traffic  to  the  end  of — well,  to  the  end  of  that  imitative 
quality  in  the  national  character,  which,  by  its  superior  in 
tensity,  serves  to  distinguish  us  from  the  apes  that  perish. 


47 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 


in. 

"What  we  most  need,  to  secure  honest  elections,"  says  a 
well-meaning  reformer,  "is  the  Clifford  or  the  Myers  voting 
machine."  Why,  truly,  here  is  a  hopeful  spirit — a  rare  and 
radiant  intelligence  suffused  with  the  conviction  that  men  can 
be  made  honest  by  machinery — that  human  character  is  a 
matter  of  gearing,  ratchets  and  dials!  One  would  give  some 
thing  to  know  how  it  feels  to  be  like  that.  A  mind  so  con 
stituted  must  be  as  happy  in  its  hope  as  a  hen  incubating  a  nest- 
ful  of  porcelain  door-knobs.  It  lives  in  rapturous  contempla 
tion  of  a  world  of  its  own  creation — a  world  where  public 
morality  and  political  good  order  are  to  be  had  by  purchase 
at  the  machine-shop.  In  that  delectable  world  religion  is  super 
fluous  ;  the  true  high  priest  is  the  mechanical  engineer ;  the  minor 
clergy  are  the  village  blacksmiths.  It  is  rather  a  pity  that 
so  fine  and  fair  a  sphere  should  prosper  only  in  the  attenuated 
ether  of  an  idiot's  understanding. 

Voting-machines  are  doubtless  well  enough;  they  save 
labor  and  enable  the  statesmen  of  the  street  to  know  the  result 
within  a  few  minutes  of  the  closing  of  the  polls — whereby  many 
are  spared  to  their  country  who  would  otherwise  incur  fatal  dis 
orders  by  exposure  to  the  night  air  while  assisting  in  awaiting 
the  returns.  But  a  voting-machine  that  human  ingenuity  can 
not  pervert,  human  ingenuity  can  not  invent. 

That  is  true,  too,  of  laws.  Your  statesman  of  a  mental 
stature  somewhat  overtopping  that  of  the  machine-person  puts 
his  faith  in  law.  Providence  has  designed  to  permit  him  to  be 
persuaded  of  the  efficacy  of  statutes — good,  stringent,  carefully 
drawn  statutes  definitively  repealing  all  the  laws  of  nature  in 
conflict  with  any  of  their  provisions.  So  the  poor  devil  (I  am 

48 


The  Came  of  Politics 


writing  of  Mr.  Legion)  turns  for  relief  from  law  to  law,  ever  on 
the  stool  of  repentance,  yet  ever  unfouling  the  anchor  of 
hope.  By  no  power  on  earth  can  his  indurated  understand 
ing  be  penetrated  by  the  truth  that  his  woful  state  is  due,  not  to 
any  laws  of  his  own,  nor  to  any  lack  of  them,  but  to  his 
rascally  refusal  to  obey  the  Golden  Rule.  How  long  is  it  since 
we  were  all  clamoring  for  the  Australian  ballot  law,  which  was 
to  make  a  new  Heaven  and  a  new  earth?  We  have  the 
Australian  ballot  law  and  the  same  old  earth  smelling  to  the 
same  old  Heaven.  Writhe  upon  the  triangle  as  we  may, 
groan  out  what  new  laws  we  will,  the  pitiless  thong  will  fall 
upon  our  bleeding  backs  as  long  as  we  deserve  it.  If  our 
sins,  which  are  scarlet,  are  to  be  washed  as  white  as  wool  it 
must  be  in  the  tears  of  a  genuine  contrition:  our  crocodile 
deliverances  will  profit  us  nothing.  We  must  stop  chasing 
dollars,  stop  lying,  stop  cheating,  stop  ignoring  art,  literature 
and  all  the  refining  agencies  and  instrumentalities  of  civilization. 
We  must  subdue  our  detestable  habit  of  shaking  hands  with 
prosperous  rascals  and  fawning  upon  the  merely  rich.  It  is  not 
permitted  to  our  employers  to  plead  in  justification  of  low 
wages  the  law  of  supply  and  demand  that  is  giving  them  high 
profits.  It  is  not  permitted  to  discontented  employees  to  break 
the  bones  of  contented  ones  and  destroy  the  foundations  of 
social  order.  It  is  infamous  to  look  upon  public  office  with 
the  lust  of  possession;  it  is  disgraceful  to  solicit  political  pre 
ferment,  to  strive  and  compete  for  "honors"  that  are  sullied 
and  tarnished  by  the  touch  of  the  reaching  hand.  Until  we 
amend  our  personal  characters  we  shall  amend  our  laws  in 
vain.  Though  Paul  plant  and  Apollos  water,  the  field  of 
reform  will  grow  nothing  but  the  figless  thistle  and  the  grapeless 
thorn.  The  State  is  an  aggregation  of  individuals.  Its  public 

49 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

character  is  the  expression  of  their  personal  ones.  By  no 
political  prestidigitation  can  it  be  made  better  and  wiser  than 
the  sum  of  their  goodness  and  wisdom.  To  expect  that  men 
who  do  not  honorably  and  intelligently  conduct  their  private 
affairs  will  honorably  and  intelligently  conduct  the  affairs  of 
the  community  is  to  be  a  fool.  We  are  told  that  out  of  nothing 
God  made  the  Heavens  and  the  earth ;  but  out  of  nothing  God 
never  did  and  man  never  can,  make  a  public  sense  of  honor  and 
a  public  conscience.  Miracles  are  now  performed  but  one  day 
of  the  year — the  twenty-ninth  of  February;  and  on  leap  year 
God  is  forbidden  to  perform  them. 

IV. 

Ye  who  hold  that  the  power  of  eloquence  is  a  thing  of  the 
past  and  the  orator  an  anachronism;  who  believe  that  the 
trend  of  political  events  and  the  results  of  parliamentary  action 
are  determined  by  committees  in  cold  consultation  and  the 
machinations  of  programmes  in  holes  and  corners,  consider  the 
ascension  of  Bryan  and  be  wise.  A  week  before  the  conven 
tion  of  1896  William  J.  Bryan  had  never  heard  of  himself; 
upon  his  natural  obscurity  was  superposed  the  opacity  of  a 
Congressional  service  that  effaced  him  from  the  memory  of 
even  his  faithful  dog,  and  made  him  immune  to  dunning. 
Today  he  is  pinnacled  upon  the  summit  of  the  tallest  political 
distinction,  gasping  in  the  thin  atmosphere  of  his  unfamiliar 
environment  and  fitly  astonished  at  the  mischance.  To  the 
dizzy  elevation  of  his  candidacy  he  was  hoisted  out  of  the 
shadow  by  his  own  tongue,  the  longest  and  liveliest  in  Christen 
dom.  Had  he  held  it — which  he  could  not  have  done  with 
both  hands — there  had  been  no  Bryan.  His  creation  was  the 

50 


The  Came  of  Politics 


unstudied  act  of  his  own  larynx;  it  said,  "Let  there  be  Bryan," 
and  there  was  Bryan.  Even  in  these  degenerate  days  there  is 
a  hope  for  the  orators  when  one  can  make  himself  a  Presiden 
tial  peril  by  merely  waving  the  red  flag  in  the  cave  of  the  winds 
and  tormenting  the  circumjacence  with  a  brandish  of  abundant 
hands. 

To  be  quite  honest,  I  do  not  entirely  believe  that  Orator 
Bryan's  tongue  had  anything  to  do  with  it.  I  have  long  been 
convinced  that  personal  persuasion  is  a  matter  of  animal  mag 
netism — what  in  its  more  obvious  manifestation  we  now  call 
hypnotism.  At  the  back  of  the  words  and  the  postures,  and 
independent  of  them,  is  that  secret,  mysterious  power,  address 
ing,  not  the  ear,  not  the  eye,  nor,  through  them,  the  understand 
ing,  but  through  its  matching  quality  in  the  auditor,  captivating 
the  will  and  enslaving  it.  That  is  how  persuasion  is  effected; 
the  spoken  words  merely  supply  a  pretext  for  surrender.  They 
enable  us  to  yield  without  loss  of  our  self-esteem,  in  the  delu 
sion  that  we  are  conceding  to  reason  what  is  really  extorted  by 
charm.  The  words  are  necessary,  too,  to  point  out  what  the 
orator  wishes  us  to  think,  if  we  are  not  already  apprised  of 
it.  When  the  nature  of  his  power  is  better  understood  and 
frankly  recognized,  he  can  spare  himself  the  toil  of  talking. 
The  parliamentary  debate  of  the  future  will  probably  be  con 
ducted  in  silence,  and  with  only  such  gestures  as  go  by  the 
name  of  "passes."  The  chairman  will  state  the  question  before 
the  House  and  the  side,  affirmative  or  negative,  to  be  taken 
by  the  honorable  member  entitled  to  the  floor.  That  gentleman 
will  rise,  train  his  compelling  orbs  upon  the  miscreants  in 
opposition,  execute  a  few  passes  and  exhaust  his  alloted  time  in 
looking  at  them.  He  will  then  yield  to  an  honorable  member 
of  dissenting  views.  The  preponderance  in  magnetic  power 

51 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Kssays 

and  hypnotic  skill  will  be  manifest  in  the  voting.  The  advant 
ages  of  the  method  are  as  plain  as  the  nose  on  an  elephant's 
face.  The  "arena"  will  no  longer  "ring"  with  anybody's 
"rousing  speech,"  to  the  irritating  abridgment  of  the  inalienable 
right  to  pursuit  of  sleep.  Honorable  members  will  lack  pro 
vocation  to  hurl  allegations  and  cuspidors.  Pitchforking  states 
men  and  tosspot  reformers  will  be  unable  to  play  at  pitch-and- 
toss  with  reputations  not  submitted  for  the  performance.  In 
short,  the  congenial  asperities  of  debate  will  be  so  mitigated  that 
the  honorable  member  from  Hades  will  retire  permanently 
from  the  hauls  of  legislation. 

V. 

"Public  opinion,"  says  Buckle,  "being  the  voice  of  the 
average  man,  is  the  voice  of  mediocrity."  Is  it  therefore  so 
very  wise  and  infallible  a  guide  as  to  be  accepted  without  other 
credentials  than  its  name  and  fame?  Ought  we  to  follow  its 
light  and  leading  with  no  better  assurance  of  the  character  of 
its  authority  than  a  count  of  noses  of  those  following  it  already, 
and  with  no  inquiry  as  to  whether  it  has  not  on  many  former 
occasions  let  them  and  their  several  sets  of  predecessors  into 
bogs  of  error  and  over  precipices  to  "eternal  mock?"  Surely 
"the  average  man,"  as  every  one  knows  him,  is  not  very  wise, 
not  very  learned,  not  very  good;  how  is  it  that  his  views,  of 
so  intricate  and  difficult  matters  as  those  of  which  public 
opinion  makes  pronouncement  through  him  are  entitled  to 
such  respect?  It  seems  to  me  that  the  average  man,  as  I  know 
him,  is  very  much  a  fool,  and  something  of  a  rogue  as  well. 
He  has  only  a  smattering  of  education,  knows  virtually  noth 
ing  of  political  history,  nor  history  of  any  kind,  is  incapable  of 

52 


The  Came  of  Politics 


logical,  that  is  to  say  clear,  thinking,  is  subject  to  the  suasion  of 
base  and  silly  prejudices,  and  selfish  beyond  expression. 
That  such  a  person's  opinions  should  be  so  obviously  better 
than  my  own  that  I  should  accept  them  instead,  and  assist  in  en 
acting  them  into  laws,  appears  to  me  most  improbable.  I  may 
**bow  to  the  will  of  the  people"  as  gracefully  as  a  defeated 
candidate,  and  for  the  same  reason,  namely,  that  I  can  not 
help  myself;  but  to  admit  that  I  was  wrong  in  my  belief  and 
flatter  the  power  that  subdues  me — no,  that  I  will  not  do. 
And  if  nobody  would  do  so  the  average  man  would  not  be  so 
very  cock-sure  of  his  infallibility  and  might  sometimes  con 
sent  to  be  counseled  by  his  betters. 

In  any  matter  of  which  the  public  has  imperfect  knowledge, 
public  opinion  is  as  likely  to  be  erroneous  as  is  the  opinion  of 
an  individual  equally  uninformed.  To  hold  otherwise  is  to 
hold  that  wisdom  can  be  got  by  combining  many  ignorances. 
A  man  who  knows  nothing  of  algebra  can  not  be  assisted  in 
the  solution  of  an  algebraic  problem  by  calling  in  a  neighbor 
who  knows  no  more  than  himself,  and  the  solution  approved  by 
the  unanimous  vote  of  ten  million  such  men  would  count  for 
nothing  against  that  of  a  competent  mathematician.  To  be 
entirely  consistent,  gentlemen  enamored  of  public  opinion 
should  insist  that  the  text  books  of  our  common  schools  should 
be  the  creation  of  a  mass  meeting,  and  all  disagreements  aris 
ing  in  the  course  of  the  work  settled  by  a  majority  vote.  That 
is  how  all  difficulties  incident  to  the  popular  translation  of  the 
Hebrew  Scriptures  were  composed.  It  should  be  admitted, 
however  that  most  of  those  voting  knew  a  little  Hebrew,  though 
not  much.  A  problem  in  mathematics  is  a  very  simple  thing 
compared  with  many  of  those  upon  which  the  people  are  called 

53 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

to  pronounce  by  resolution  and  ballot — for  example,  a  question 
of  finance. 

"The  voice  of  the  people  is  the  voice  of  God" — the  say 
ing  is  so  respectably  old  that  it  comes  to  us  in  the  Latin.  He 
is  a  strange,  an  unearthly  politician  who  has  not  a  score  of 
times  publicly  and  solemnly  signified  his  faith  in  it.  But  does 
anyone  really  believe  it?  Let  us  see.  In  the  period  between 
1 859  and  1 885,  the  Democratic  party  was  defeated  six  times  in 
succession.  The  voice  of  the  people  pronounced  it  in  error  and 
unfit  to  govern.  Yet  after  each  overthrow  it  came  back  into  the 
field  gravely  reaffirming  its  faith  in  the  principles  that  God 
had  condemned.  Then  God  twice  reversed  Himself,  and  the 
Republicans  "never  turned  a  hair,"  but  set  about  beating  Him 
with  as  firm  a  confidence  of  success  (justified  by  the  event)  as 
they  had  known  in  the  years  of  their  prosperity.  Doubtless 
in  every  instance  of  a  political  party's  defeat  there  are  defec 
tions,  but  doubtless  not  all  are  due  to  the  voice  that  spoke  out 
of  the  great  white  light  that  fell  about  Saul  of  Tarsus.  By  the 
way,  it  is  worth  observing  that  that  clever  gentleman  was 
under  no  illusion  regarding  the  origin  of  the  voice  that  wrought 
his  celebrated  "flop";  he  did  not  confound  it  with  the  vox 
populi.  The  people  of  his  time  and  place  had  no  objection  to 
the  persecution  that  he  was  conducting,  and  could  persecute 
a  trifle  themselves  upon  occasion. 

Majorities  rule,  when  they  do  rule,  not  because  they  ought, 
but  because  they  can.  We  vote  in  order  to  learn  without 
fighting  which  party  is  the  stronger;  it  is  less  disagreeable  to 
learn  it  that  way  than  the  other  way.  Sometimes  the  party  that 
is  numerically  the  weaker  is  by  possession  of  the  Government 
actually  the  stronger,  and  could  maintain  itself  in  power  by  an 
appeal  to  arms,  but  the  habit  of  submitting  when  outvoted  is 

54 


The  Came  of  Politics 


hard  to  break.  Moreover,  we  all  recognize  in  a  subconscious 
way,  the  reasonableness  of  the  habit  as  a  practical  method  of 
getting  on;  and  there  is  always  the  confident  hope  of  success 
in  the  next  canvass.  That  one's  cause  will  succeed  because 
it  ought  to  succeed  is  perhaps  the  most  general  and  invincible 
folly  affecting  the  human  judgment.  Observation  can  not 
shake  it,  nor  experience  destroy.  Though  you  bray  a  partisan 
in  the  mortar  of  adversity  till  he  numbers  the  strokes  of  the 
pestle  by  the  hairs  of  his  head,  yet  will  not  this  fool  notion 
depart  from  him.  He  is  always  going  to  win  the  next  time, 
however  frequently  and  disastrously  he  has  lost  before.  And 
he  can  always  give  you  the  most  cogent  reasons  for  the  faith 
that  is  in  him.  His  chief  reliance  is  on  the  "fatal  mistakes" 
made  since  the  last  election  by  the  other  party.  There  never 
was  a  year  in  which  the  party  in  power  and  the  party  out  of 
power  did  not  make  bad  mistakes — mistakes  which,  unlike 
eggs  and  fish,  seem  always  worst  when  freshest.  If  idiotic 
errors  of  policy  were  always  fatal,  no  party  would  ever  win  an 
election  and  there  would  be  a  hope  of  better  government 
under  the  benign  sway  of  the  domestic  cow. 

VI. 

Each  political  party  accuses  the  "opposing  candidate"  of 
refusing  to  answer  certain  questions  which  somebody  has 
chosen  to  ask  him.  I  think  myself  it  is  discreditable  for  a 
candidate  to  answer  any  questions  at  all,  to  make  speeches,  de 
clare  his  policy,  or  to  do  anything  whatever  to  get  himself 
elected.  If  a  political  party  choose  to  nominate  a  man  so  obscure 
that  his  character  and  his  views  on  all  public  questions  are  not 
known  or  inferable  he  ought  to  have  the  dignity  to  refuse  to  ex- 

55 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

pound  them.  As  to  the  strife  for  office  being  a  pursuit  worthy 
of  a  noble  ambition,  I  do  not  think  so;  nor  shall  I  believe  that 
many  do  think  so  until  the  term  "office  seeker'*  carries  a  less  op 
probrious  meaning  and  the  dictum  that  "the  office  should  seek 
the  man,not  the  man  the  office," has  a  narrower  currency  among 
all  manner  of  persons.  That  by  acts  and  words  generally  felt 
to  be  discreditable  a  man  may  evoke  great  popular  enthusiasm 
is  not  at  all  surprising.  The  late  Mr.  Barnum  was  not  the  first 
nor  the  last  to  observe  that  the  people  love  to  be  humbugged. 
They  love  an  impostor  and  a  scamp,  and  the  best  service  that 
you  can  do  for  a  candidate  for  high  political  preferment  is  to 
prove  him  a  little  better  than  a  thief,  but  not  quite  so  good  as 
a  thug. 

VII. 

The  view  is  often  taken  that  a  representative  is  the  same 
thing  as  a  delegate;  that  he  is  to  have,  and  can  honestly  enter 
tain,  no  opinion  that  is  at  variance  with  the  whims  and  the 
caprices  of  his  constituents.  This  is  the  very  reductio  ad 
absurdum  of  representative  government.  That  it  is  the 
dominant  theory  of  the  future  there  can  be  little  doubt,  for  it 
is  of  a  piece  with  the  progress  downward  which  is  the  invariable 
and  unbroken  tendency  of  republican  institutions.  It  fits  in 
well  with  manhood  suffrage,  rotation  in  office,  unrestricted 
patronage,  assessment  of  subordinates,  an  elective  judiciary 
and  the  rest  of  it.  This  theory  of  representative  institutions  is 
the  last  and  lowest  stage  in  our  pleasant  performance  of 
"shooting  Niagara."  When  it  shall  have  universal  recogni 
tion  and  assent  we  shall  have  been  fairly  engulfed  in  the  whirl 
pool,  and  the  buzzard  of  anarchy  may  hopefully  whet  his 
beak  for  the  national  carcass.  My  view  of  the  matter — which 

56 


The  Game  of  Politics 


has  the  further  merit  of  being  the  view  held  by  those  who 
founded  this  Government — is  that  a  man  holding  office  from 
and  for  the  people  is  in  conscience  and  honor  bound  to  do 
what  seems  to  his  judgment  best  for  the  general  welfare,  re 
spectfully  regardless  of  any  and  all  other  considerations.  This 
is  especially  true  of  legislators,  to  whom  such  specific  "instruc 
tions'*  as  constituents  sometimes  send  are  an  impertinence  and 
an  insult.  Pushed  to  its  logical  conclusion,  the  "delegate"  idea 
would  remove  all  necessity  of  electing  men  of  brains  and 
judgment ;  one  man  properly  connected  with  his  constituents  by 
telegraph  would  make  as  good  a  legislator  as  another.  Indeed, 
as  a  matter  of  economy,  one  representative  should  act  for 
many  constituencies,  receiving  his  instructions  how  to  vote  from 
mass  meetings  in  each.  This,  besides  being  logical,  would  have 
the  added  advantage  of  widening  and  hardening  the  power  of 
the  local  "bosses,"  who,  by  properly  managing  the  showing  of 
hands  could  have  the  same  beneficent  influence  in  national 
affairs  that  they  now  enjoy  in  municipal.  The  plan  would  be 
a  pretty  good  one  if  there  were  not  so  many  other  ways  for 
the  Nation  to  go  to  the  Devil  that  it  appears  needless. 

VIII. 

With  a  wiser  wisdom  than  was  given  to  them,  our  fore 
fathers  in  making  the  Constitution  would  not  have  provided  that 
each  House  of  Congress  "shall  be  the  judge  of  the  elections, 
returns  and  qualifications  of  its  own  members."  They  would 
have  foreseen  that  a  ruling  majority  of  Congress  could  not  safely 
be  trusted  to  exercise  this  power  justly  in  the  public  interest,  but 
would  abuse  it  in  the  interest  of  party.  A  man's  right  to  sit 
in  a  legislative  body  should  be  determined,  not  by  that  body, 

57 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

which  has  neither  the  impartiality,  the  knowledge  of  evidence 
nor  the  time  to  determine  it  rightly,  but  by  the  courts  of  law. 
That  is  how  it  is  done  in  England,  where  Parliament  volun 
tarily  surrendered  the  right  to  say  by  whom  the  constituencies 
shall  be  represented,  and  there  is  no  disposition  to  resume  it. 
As  the  vices  hunt  in  packs,  so,  too,  virtues  are  gregarious;  if 
our  Congress  had  the  righteousness  to  decide  contested  elec 
tions  justly  it  would  have  also  the  self-denial  not  to  wish  to 
decide  them  at  all. 

IX. 

The  purpose  of  the  legislative  custom  of  "eulogizing" 
dead  members  of  Congress  is  not  apparent  unless  it  is  to  add  a 
terror  to  death  and  make  honorable  and  self-respecting  members 
rather  bear  the  ills  they  have  than  escape  through  the  gates  of 
death  to  others  that  they  know  a  good  deal  about.  If  a  member 
of  that  kind,  who  has  had  the  bad  luck  to  "go  before,"  could 
be  consulted  he  would  indubitably  say  that  he  was  sorry  to  be 
dead;  and  that  is  not  a  natural  frame  of  mind  in  one  who  is 
exempt  from  the  necessity  of  himself  "delivering  a  eulogy." 

It  may  be  urged  that  the  Congressional  "eulogy"  expresses 
in  a  general  way  the  eulogist's  notion  of  what  he  would  like  to 
have  somebody  say  of  himself  when  he  is  by  death  elected  to  the 
Lower  House.  If  so,  then  Heaven  help  him  to  a  better  taste. 
Meanwhile  it  is  a  patriotic  duty  to  prevent  him  from  indulging 
at  the  public  expense  the  taste  that  he  has.  There  have  been  a 
few  men  in  Congress  who  could  speak  of  the  character  and 
services  of  a  departed  member  with  truth  and  even  eloquence. 
One  such  was  Senator  Vest.  Of  many  others,  the  most 
charitable  thing  that  one  can  conscientiously  say  is  that  one 

58 


The  Game  of  Politics 


would  a  little  rather  hear  a  "eulogy"  by  them  than  on  them. 
Considering  that  there  are  many  kinds  of  brains  and  only  one 
kind  of  no  brains,  their  diversity  of  gifts  is  remarkable,  but  one 
characteristic  they  have  in  common :  they  are  all  poets.  Their 
efforts  in  the  way  of  eulogium  illustrate  and  illuminate  Pascal's 
obscure  saying  that  poetry  is  a  particular  sadness.  If  not  sad 
themselves,  they  are  at  least  the  cause  of  sadness  in  others,  for 
no  sooner  do  they  take  to  their  legs  to  remind  us  that  life  is 
fleeting,  and  to  make  us  glad  that  it  is,  than  they  burst  into 
bloom  as  poets  all!  Some  one  has  said  that  in  the  contempla 
tion  of  death  there  is  something  that  belittles.  Perhaps  that 
explains  the  transformation.  Anyhow  the  Congressional 
eulogist  takes  to  verse  as  naturally  as  a  moth  to  a  candle,  and 
with  about  the  same  result  to  his  reputation  for  sense. 

The  poetry  is  commonly  not  his  own;  when  it  violates 
every  law  of  sense,  fitness,  metre,  rhyme  and  taste  it  is.  But 
nine  times  in  ten  it  is  some  dog's-eared,  shop-worn  quotation 
from  one  of  the  "standard"  bards,  usually  Shakspere.  There 
are  familiar  passages  from  that  poet  which  have  been  so  often 
heard  in  "the  halls  of  legislation"  that  they  have  acquired  an 
infamy  which  unfits  them  for  publication  in  a  decent  family 
newspaper;  and  Shakspere  himself,  reposing  in  Elysium  on  his 
bed  of  asphodel  and  moly,  omits  them  when  reading  his  com 
plete  works  to  the  shades  of  Kit  Marlowe  and  Ben  Jonson, 
for  their  sins. 

This  whole  business  ought  to  be  "cut  out."  It  is  not  only 
a  waste  of  time  and  a  sore  trial  to  the  patience  of  the  country; 
it  is  absolutely  immoral.  It  is  not  true  that  a  member  of 
Congress  who,  while  living  was  a  most  ordinary  mortal, 
becomes  by  the  accident  of  death  a  hero,  a  saint,  "an  example 
to  American  youth."  Nobody  believes  these  abominable 

59 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

"eulogies,"  and  nobody  should  be  permitted  to  utter  them  in 
the  time  and  place  designated  for  another  purpose.  A  "tribute" 
that  is  exacted  by  custom  and  has  not  the  fire  and  light  of  spon 
taneity  is  without  sincerity  or  sense.  A  simple  resolution  of 
regret  and  respect  is  all  that  the  occasion  requires  and  would 
not  inhibit  any  further  utterance  that  friends  and  admirers  of 
the  deceased  might  be  moved  to  make  elsewhere.  If  any 
bereaved  gentlemen,  feeling  his  heart  getting  into  his  head, 
wishes  to  tickle  his  ear  with  his  tongue  by  way  of  standardizing 
his  emotion  let  him  hire  a  hall  and  do  so.  But  he  should  not 
make  the  Capitol  a  "Place  of  Wailing"  and  the  Congres 
sional  Record  a  book  of  bathos. 


60 


Some  Features 
of  the  Law 


Some  Features  of  the  LaT» 


I. 

HERE  is  a  difference  between  religion  and  the 
amazing  circumstructure  which,  under  the  name 
of  theology,  the  priesthoods  have  builded  round 
about  it,  which  for  centuries  they  made  the  world 
believe  was  the  true  temple,  and  which,  after  incalculable 
mischiefs  wrought,  immeasurable  blood  spilled  in  its  extension 
and  consolidation,  is  only  now  beginning  to  crumble  at  the 
touch  of  reason.  There  is  the  same  difference  between  the  laws 
and  the  law — the  naked  statutes  (bad  enough,  God  knows) 
and  the  incomputable  additions  made  to  them  by  lawyers. 
This  immense  body  of  superingenious  writings  it  is  that  we  all 
are  responsible  to  in  person  and  property.  It  is  unquestion 
able  authority  for  setting  aside  any  statute  that  any  legislative 
body  ever  passed  or  can  pass.  In  it  are  dictates  of  recognized 
validity  for  turning  topsy-turvy  every  principle  of  justice  and 
reversing  every  decree  of  reason.  There  is  no  fallacy  so  mon 
strous,  no  deduction  so  hideously  unrelated  to  common  sense,  as 
not  to  receive,  somewhere  in  the  myriad  pages  of  this  awful 
compilation,  a  support  that  any  judge  in  the  land  would  be 
proud  to  recognize  with  a  decision  if  ably  persuaded.  I  do 
not  say  that  the  lawyers  are  altogether  responsible  for  the 
existence  of  this  mass  of  disastrous  rubbish,  nor  for  its  domina 
tion  of  the  laws.  They  only  create  and  thrust  it  down  our 
throats;  we  are  guilty  of  contributory  negligence  in  not  biting 
the  spoon. 

63 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

As  long  as  there  exists  the  right  of  appeal  there  is  a  chance 
of  acquittal.  Otherwise  the  right  of  appeal  would  be  a  sham 
and  an  insult  more  intolerable,  even,  than  that  of  the  man 
convicted  of  murder  to  say  why  he  should  not  receive  the 
sentence  which  nothing  he  may  say  will  avert.  So  long  as 
acquittal  may  ensue  guilt  is  not  established.  Why,  then  are 
men  sentenced  before  they  are  proved  guilty?  Why  are  they 
punished  in  the  middle  of  proceedings  against  them?  A 
lawyer  can  reply  to  these  questions  in  a  thousand  ingenious 
ways ;  there  is  but  one  answer.  It  is  because  we  are  a  barbarous 
race,  submitting  to  laws  made  by  lawyers  for  lawyers.  Let 
the  "legal  fraternity"  reflect  that  a  lawyer  is  one  whose  pro 
fession  it  is  to  circumvent  the  law;  that  it  is  a  part  of  his 
business  to  mislead  and  befog  the  court  of  which  he  is  an 
officer ;  that  it  is  considered  right  and  reasonable  for  him  to  live 
by  a  division  of  the  spoils  of  crime  and  misdemeanor;  that  the 
utmost  atonement  he  ever  makes  for  acquitting  a  man  whom  he 
knows  to  be  guilty  is  to  convict  a  man  whom  he  knows  to  be  in 
nocent.  I  have  looked  into  this  thing  a  bit  and  it  is  my  judgment 
that  all  the  methods  of  our  courts,  and  the  traditions  of  bench 
and  bar  exist  and  are  perpetuated,  altered  and  improved,  for  the 
one  purpose  of  enabling  the  lawyers  as  a  class  to  exact  the  great 
est  amount  of  money  from  the  rest  of  mankind.  The  laws  are 
mostly  made  by  lawyers,  and  so  made  as  to  encourage  and 
compel  litigation.  By  lawyers  they  are  interpreted  and  by 
lawyers  enforced  for  their  own  profit  and  advantage.  The 
whole  intricate  and  interminable  machinery  of  precedent,  rul 
ings,  decisions,  objections,  writs  of  error,  motions  for  new  trials, 
appeals,  reversals,  affirmations  and  the  rest  of  it,  is  a  trans 
parent  and  iniquitous  systems  of  "cinching."  What  remedy 
would  I  propose?  None.  There  is  none  to  propose.  The 

64 


Some  Features  of  the,  Lccu> 


lawyers  have  "got  us"  and  they  mean  to  keep  us.  But  if 
thoughtless  children  of  the  frontier  sometimes  rise  to  tar  and 
feather  the  legal  pelt  may  God's  grace  go  with  them  and  amen. 
I  do  not  believe  there  is  a  lawyer  in  Heaven,  but  by  a  bath  of 
tar  and  a  coating  of  hen's-down  they  can  be  made  to  resemble 
angels  more  nearly  than  by  any  other  process. 

The  matchless  villainy  of  making  men  suffer  for  crimes  of 
which  they  may  eventually  be  acquitted  is  consistent  with 
our  entire  system  of  laws — a  system  so  complicated  and  con 
tradictory  that  a  judge  simply  does  as  he  pleases,  subject  only 
to  the  custom  of  giving  for  his  action  reasons  that  at  his 
option  may  or  may  not  be  derived  from  the  statute.  He  may 
sternly  affirm  that  he  sits  there  to  interpret  the  law  as  he  finds 
it,  not  to  make  it  accord  with  his  personal  notions  of  right 
and  justice.  Or  he  may  declare  that  it  could  never  have  been 
the  Legislature's  intention  to  do  wrong,  and  so,  shielded  by  the 
useful  phrase  contra  bonos  mores,  pronounce  that  illegal  which 
he  chooses  to  consider  inexpedient.  Or  he  may  be  guided  by 
either  of  any  two  inconsistent  precedents,  as  best  suits  his  pur 
pose.  Or  he  may  throw  aside  both  statute  and  precedent,  dis 
regard  good  morals,  and  justify  the  judgment  that  he  wishes 
to  deliver  by  what  other  lawyers  have  written  in  books,  and 
still  others,  without  anybody's  authority,  have  chosen  to  accept 
as  a  part  of  the  law.  I  have  in  mind  judges  whom  I  have 
observed  to  do  all  these  things  in  a  single  term  of  court,  and 
could  mention  one  who  has  done  them  all  in  a  single  decision, 
and  that  not  a  very  long  one.  The  amazing  feature  of  the 
matter  is  that  all  these  methods  are  lawful — made  so,  not  by 
legislative  enactment,  but  by  the  judges.  Language  can  not  be 
used  with  sufficient  lucidity  and  positiveness  to  bind  them. 

The  legal  purpose  of  a  preliminary  examination  is  not  the 

65 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

discovery  of  a  criminal;  it  is  the  ascertaining  of  the  probable 
guilt  or  innocence  of  the  person  already  charged.  To  permit 
that  person's  counsel  to  insult  and  madden  the  various  assisting 
witnesses  in  the  hope  of  making  them  seem  to  incriminate  them 
selves  instead  of  him  by  statements  that  may  afterward  be  used 
to  confuse  a  jury — that  is  perversion  of  law  to  defeat  justice. 
The  outrageous  character  of  the  practice  is  seen  to  better 
advantage  when  contrasted  with  the  tender  consideration  en 
joyed  by  the  person  actually  accused  and  presumably  guilty — 
the  presumption  of  his  innocence  being  as  futile  a  fiction  as 
that  a  sheep's  tail  is  a  leg  when  called  so.  Actually,  the 
prisoner  in  a  criminal  trial  is  the  only  person  supposed  to 
have  a  knowledge  of  the  facts  who  is  not  compelled  to  testify ! 
And  this  amazing  exemption  is  given  him  by  way  of  immunity 
from  the  snares  and  pitfalls  with  which  the  paths  of  all  wit 
nesses  are  wantonly  beset!  To  a  visiting  Lunarian  it  would 
seem  strange  indeed  that  in  a  Terrestrial  court  of  justice  it 
is  not  deemed  desirable  for  an  accused  person  to  incriminate 
himself,  and  that  it  is  deemed  desirable  for  a  subpoena  to  be 
more  dreaded  than  a  warrant. 

When  a  child,  a  wife,  a  servant,  a  student — any  one  under 
personal  authority  or  bound  by  obligation  of  honor — is  accused 
or  suspected  an  explanation  is  demanded,  and  refusal  to  testify 
is  held,  and  rightly  held,  a  confession  of  guilt.  To  question 
the  accused — rigorously  and  sharply  to  examine  him  on  all 
matters  relating  to  the  offense,  and  even  trap  him  if  he  seem 
to  be  lying — that  is  Nature's  method  of  criminal  procedure; 
why  in  our  public  trials  do  we  forego  its  advantages?  It  may 
annoy;  a  person  arrested  for  crime  must  expect  annoyance. 
It  can  not  make  an  innocent  man  incriminate  himself,  not  even 
a  witness,  but  it  can  make  a  rogue  do  so,  and  therein  lies  its 

66 


Some  Features  of  the  Larv 


value.  Any  pressure  short  of  physical  torture  or  the  threat  of 
it,  that  can  be  put  upon  a  rogue  to  make  him  assist  in  his  own 
undoing  is  just  and  therefore  expedient. 

This  ancient  and  efficient  safeguard  to  rascality,  the  right 
of  a  witness  to  refuse  to  testify  when  his  testimony  would  tend 
to  convict  him  of  crime,  has  been  strengthened  by  a  decision 
of  the  United  States  Supreme  Court.  That  will  probably  add 
another  century  or  two  to  its  mischievous  existence,  and  possibly 
prove  the  first  act  in  such  an  extension  of  it  that  eventually  a 
witness  can  not  be  compelled  to  testify  at  all.  In  fact  it  is 
difficult  to  see  how  he  can  be  compelled  to  now  if  he  has  the 
hardihood  to  exercise  his  constitutional  right  without  shame  and 
with  an  intelligent  consciousness  of  its  limitless  application. 

The  case  in  which  the  Supreme  Court  made  the  decision 
was  one  in  which  a  witness  refused  to  say  whether  he  had  re 
ceived  from  a  defendant  railway  company  a  rate  on  grain  ship 
ments  lower  than  the  rate  open  to  all  shippers.  The  trial  was  in 
the  United  States  District  Court  for  the  Northern  District  of 
Illinois,  and  Judge  Gresham  chucked  the  scoundrel  into  jail. 
He  naturally  applied  to  the  Supreme  Court  for  relief,  and  that 
high  tribunal  gave  joy  to  every  known  or  secret  malefactor  in 
the  country  by  deciding — according  to  law,  no  doubt — that 
witnesses  in  a  criminal  case  can  not  be  compelled  to  testify  to 
anything  that  "might  tend  to  criminate  them  In  any  TPap,  or 
subject  them  to  possible  prosecution."  The  italics  are  my  own 
and  seem  to  me  to  indicate,  about  as  clearly  as  extended  com 
ment  could,  the  absolutely  boundless  nature  of  the  immunity 
that  the  decision  confirms  or  confers.  It  is  to  be  hoped  that 
some  public-spirited  gentleman  called  to  the  stand  in  some 
celebrated  case  may  point  the  country's  attention  to  the  state 
of  the  law  by  refusing  to  tell  his  name,  age  or  occupation,  or 

67 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

answer  any  question  whatever.  And  it  would  be  a  fitting 
finale  to  the  farce  if  he  would  threaten  the  too  curious  attorney 
with  an  action  for  damages  for  compelling  a  disclosure  of 
character. 

Most  lawyers  have  made  so  profound  a  study  of  human 
nature  as  to  think  that  if  they  have  shown  a  man  to  be  of  loose 
life  with  regard  to  women  they  have  shown  him  to  be  one  that 
would  tell  needless  lies  to  a  jury — a  conviction  unsupported  by 
the  familiar  facts  of  life  and  character.  Different  men  have 
different  vices,  and  addiction  to  one  kind  of  "upsetting  sin" 
does  not  imply  addiction  to  an  unrelated  kind.  Doubtless  a 
rake  is  a  liar  in  so  far  as  is  needful  to  concealment,  but  it  does 
not  follow  that  he  will  commit  perjury  to  save  a  horsethief  from 
the  penitentiary  or  send  a  good  man  to  the  gallows.  As  to 
lying,  generally,  he  is  not  conspicuously  worse  than  the  mere 
lover,  male  or  female;  for  lovers  have  been  liars  from  the 
beginning  of  time.  They  deceive  when  it  is  necessary  and 
when  it  is  not.  Schopenhauer  says  that  it  is  because  of  a  sense 
of  guilt — they  contemplate  the  commission  of  a  crime  and,  like 
other  criminals,  cover  their  tracks.  I  am  not  prepared  to  say 
if  that  is  the  true  explanation,  but  to  the  fact  to  be  explained  I 
am  ready  to  testify  with  lifted  arms.  Yet  no  cross-examining 
attorney  tries  to  break  the  credibility  of  a  witness  by  showing 
that  he  is  in  love. 

An  habitual  liar,  if  disinterested,  makes  about  as  good  a 
witness  as  anybody.  There  is  really  no  such  thing  as  "the 
lust  of  lying:"  falsehoods  are  told  for  advantage — commonly 
a  shadowy  and  illusory  advantage,  but  one  distinctly  enough 
had  in  mind.  Discerning  no  opportunity  to  promote  his  interest, 
tickle  his  vanity  or  feed  a  grudge,  the  habitual  liar  will  tell  the 
truth.  If  lawyers  would  study  human  nature  with  half  the 

68 


Some  Features  of  the  Law 


assiduity  that  they  give  to  resolution  of  hairs  into  their  longi 
tudinal  elements  they  would  be  better  fitted  for  service  of  the 
devil  than  they  have  now  the  usefulness  to  be. 

I  have  always  asserted  the  right  and  expediency  of  cross- 
examining  attorneys  in  court  with  a  view  to  testing  their 
credibility.  An  attorney's  relation  to  the  trial  is  closer  and 
more  important  than  that  of  a  witness.  He  has  more  to  say 
and  more  opportunities  to  deceive  the  jury,  not  only  by  naked 
lying,  but  by  both  suppressio  veri  and  suggestio  falsi  Why  is 
it  not  important  to  ascertain  his  credibility;  and  if  an  inquiry 
into  his  private  life  and  public  reputation  will  assist,  as  him 
self  avers,  why  should  he  not  be  put  upon  the  grill  and  com 
pelled  to  sweat  out  the  desired  incrimination?  I  should  think  it 
might  give  good  results,  for  example,  to  compel  him  to  answer  a 
few  questions  touching,  not  his  private  life,  but  his  professional. 
Somewhat  like  this: 

"Did  you  ever  defend  a  client,  knowing  him  to  be  guilty?" 

"What  was  your  motive  in  doing  so?" 

"But  in  addition  to  your  love  of  fair  play  had  you  not 
also  the  hope  and  assurance  of  a  fee?" 

"In  defending  your  guilty  client  did  you  declare  your 
belief  in  his  innocence?" 

"Yes,  I  understand,  but  necessary  as  it  may  have  been  (in 
that  it  helped  to  defeat  justice  and  earn  your  fee)  was  not  your 
declaration  a  lie?" 

"Do  you  believe  it  right  to  lie  for  the  purpose  of  circum 
venting  justice? — yes  or  no?" 

"Do  you  believe  it  right  to  lie  for  personal  gain — yes  or  no  ?" 

"Then  why  did  you  do  both?" 

"A  man  who  lies  to  beat  the  laws  and  fill  his  purse  is — 
what?" 

69 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

"In  defending  a  murderer  did  you  ever  misrepresent  the 
character,  acts,  motives  and  intentions  of  the  man  that  he 
murdered — never  mind  the  purpose  and  effect  of  such  misrepre 
sentation — yes  or  no?" 

"That  is  what  we  call  slander  of  the  dead,  is  it  not?" 

"What  is  the  most  accurate  name  you  can  think  of  for  one 
who  slanders  the  dead  to  defeat  justice  and  promote  his  own 
fortune?" 

"Yes,  I  know — such  practices  are  allowed  by  the  'ethics* 
of  your  profession,  but  can  you  point  to  any  evidence  that 
they  are  allowed  by  Jesus  Christ?" 

"If  in  former  trials  you  have  obstructed  justice  by  slander 
of  the  dead,  by  falsely  affirming  the  innocence  of  the  guilty, 
by  cheating  in  argument,  by  deceiving  the  court  whom  you  are 
sworn  to  serve  and  assist,  and  have  done  all  this  for  personal 
gain,  do  you  expect,  and  is  it  reasonable  for  you  to  expect,  the 
jury  in  this  case  to  believe  you?" 

"One  moment  more,  please.  Did  you  ever  accept  an 
annual,  or  other  fee  conditioned  on  your  not  taking  any  action 
against  a  corporation?" 

"While  in  receipt  of  such  refrainer — I  beg  you  pardon, 
retainer — did  you  ever  prosecute  a  blackmailer?" 

It  will  be  seen  that  in  testing  the  credibility  of  a  lawyer 
it  is  needless  to  go  into  his  private  life  and  his  character  as  a 
man  and  a  citizen :  his  professional  practices  are  an  ample  field 
in  which  to  search  for  offenses  against  man  and  God.  Indeed, 
it  is  sufficient  simply  to  ask  him:  "What  is  your  view  of  'the 
ethics  of  your  profession*  as  a  suitable  standard  of  conduct 
for  a  pirate  of  the  Spanish  Main?" 

The  moral  sense  of  the  laymen  is  dimly  conscious  of  some 
thing  wrong  in  the  ethics  of  the  noble  profession;  the  lawyers 

70 


Some  Features  of  the  Law 


affirming,  rightly  enough,  a  public  necessity  for  them  and  their 
mercenary  services,  permit  their  thrift  to  construe  it  vaguely 
as  personal  justification.  But  nobody  has  blown  away  from 
the  matter  its  brumous  encompassment  and  let  in  the  light  upon 
it.  It  is  very  simple. 

Is  it  honorable  for  a  lawyer  to  try  to  clear  a  man  that  he 
knows  deserves  conviction?  That  is  not  the  entire  question 
by  much.  Is  it  honorable  to  pretend  to  believe  what  you  do 
not  believe?  Is  it  honorable  to  lie?  I  submit  that  these 
questions  are  not  answered  affirmatively  by  showing  the  dis 
advantage  to  the  public  and  to  civilization  of  a  lawyer  refus 
ing  to  serve  a  known  offender.  The  popular  interest,  like  any 
other  good  cause,  can  be  and  commonly  is,  served  by  foul 
means.  Justice  itself  may  be  promoted  by  acts  essentially  un 
just.  In  serving  a  sordid  ambition  a  powerful  scoundrel  may 
by  acts  in  themselves  wicked  augment  the  prosperity  of  a  whole 
nation.  I  have  not  the  right  to  deceive  and  lie  in  order  to 
advantage  my  fellowmen,  any  more  than  I  have  the  right  to 
steal  or  murder  to  advantage  them,  nor  have  my  fellowmen  the 
power  to  grant  me  that  indulgence. 

The  question  of  a  lawyer's  right  to  clear  a  known  criminal 
(with  the  several  questions  involved)  is  not  answered  affirma 
tively  by  showing  that  the  law  forbids  him  to  decline  a  case 
for  reasons  personal  to  himself — not  even  if  we  admit  the 
statute's  moral  authority.  Preservation  of  conscience  and 
character  is  a  civic  duty,  as  well  as  a  personal;  one's  fellow- 
men  have  a  distinct  interest  in  it.  That,  I  admit,  is  an  argument 
rather  in  the  manner  of  an  attorney;  clearly  enough  the  intent 
of  this  statute  is  to  compel  an  attorney  to  cheat  and  lie  for  any 
rascal  that  wants  him  to.  In  that  sense  it  may  be  regarded  as 
a  law  softening  the  rigor  of  all  laws ;  it  does  not  mitigate  punish- 

71 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

ments,  but  mitigates  the  chance  of  incurring  them.  The  infamy 
of  it  lies  in  forbidding  an  attorney  to  be  a  gentleman.  Like 
all  laws  it  falls  something  short  of  its  intent:  many  attorneys, 
even  some  who  defend  that  law,  are  as  honorable  as  is  consist 
ent  with  the  practice  of  deceit  to  serve  crime. 

It  will  not  dp  to  say  that  an  attorney  in  defending  a  client 
is  not  compelled  to  cheat  and  lie.  What  kind  of  defense  could 
be  made  by  any  one  who  did  not  profess  belief  in  the  innocence 
of  his  client? — did  not  affirm  it  in  the  most  serious  and  im 
pressive  way? — did  not  lie?  How  would  it  profit  the  defense 
to  be  conducted  by  one  who  would  not  meet  the  prosecution's 
grave  asseverations  of  belief  in  the  prisoner's  guilt  by  equally 
grave  assurances  of  faith  in  his  innocence?  And  in  point  of 
fact,  when  was  counsel  for  the  defense  ever  known  to  forego 
the  advantage  of  that  solemn  falsehood?  If  I  am  asked  what 
would  become  of  accused  persons  if  they  had  to  prove  their  in 
nocence  to  the  lawyers  before  making  a  defense  in  court,  I  reply 
that  I  do  not  know;  and  in  my  turn  I  ask:  What  would  be 
come  of  Humpty  Dumpty  if  all  the  king's  horses  and  all  the 
king's  men  were  an  isosceles  triangle  ? 

It  all  amounts  to  this,  that  lawyers  want  clients  and  are 
not  particular  about  the  kind  of  clients  that  they  get.  All  this 
is  very  ugly  work,  and  a  public  interest  that  can  not  be  served 
without  it  would  better  be  unserved. 

I  grant,  in  short,  'tis  better  all  around 
That  ambidextrous  consciences  abound 
In  courts  of  law  to  do  the  dirty  work 
That  self-respecting  scavengers  would  shirk. 
What  then?  Who  serves  however  clean  a  plan 
By  doing  dirty  work,  he  is  a  dirty  man. 
72 


Some  Features  of  the  Law 


But  in  point  of  fact  I  do  not  "grant"  any  such  thing.  It 
is  not  for  the  public  interest  that  a  rogue  have  the  same  freedom 
of  defense  as  an  honest  man;  it  should  be  a  good  deal  harder 
for  him.  His  troubles  should  begin,  not  when  he  seeks  acquital, 
but  when  he  seeks  counsel.  It  would  be  better  for  the  community 
if  he  could  not  obtain  the  services  of  a  reputable  attorney,  or 
any  attorney  at  all.  A  defense  that  can  not  be  made  with 
out  his  attorney's  actual  knowledge  of  his  guilt  should  be  im 
possible  to  him.  Nor  should  he  be  permitted  to  remain  off  the 
witness  stand  lest  he  incriminate  himself.  It  ought  to  be  the 
aim  of  the  court  to  let  him  incriminate  himself — to  make  him 
do  so  if  his  testimony  will.  In  our  courts  that  natural  method 
would  serve  the  ends  of  justice  greatly  better  than  the  one  that 
we  have.  Testimony  of  the  guilty  would  assist  in  conviction; 
that  of  the  innocent  would  not. 

As  to  the  general  question  of  a  judge's  right  to  inflict 
arbitrary  punishment  for  words  that  he  may  be  pleased  to  hold 
disrespectful  to  himself  or  another  judge,  I  do  not  myself 
believe  that  any  such  right  exists;  the  practice  seems  to  be 
merely  a  survival — a  heritage  from  the  dark  days  of  irrespon 
sible  power,  when  the  scope  of  judicial  authority  had  no  other 
bounds  than  fear  of  the  royal  gout  or  indigestion.  If  in  these 
modern  days  the  same  right  is  to  exist  it  may  be  necessary  to 
revive  the  old  checks  upon  it  by  restoring  the  throne.  In  free 
ing  us  from  the  monarchial  chain,  the  coalition  of  European 
Powers  commonly  known  in  American  history  as  "the  valor  of 
our  forefathers"  stripped  us  starker  than  they  knew. 

Suppose  an  attorney  should  find  his  client's  interests  im 
periled  by  a  prejudiced  or  corrupt  judge — what  is  he  to  do? 
If  he  may  not  make  representations  to  that  effect,  supporting 
them  with  evidence,  where  evidence  is  possible  and  by  inference 

73 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

where  it  is  not,  what  means  of  protection  shall  he  venture  to 
adopt?  If  it  be  urged  in  objection  that  judges  are  never 
prejudiced  nor  corrupt  I  confess  that  I  shall  have  no  answer: 
the  proposition  will  deprive  me  of  breath. 

If  contempt  is  not  a  crime  it  should  not  be  punished;  if 
a  crime  it  should  be  punished  as  other  crimes  are  punished — 
by  indictment  or  information,  trial  by  jury  if  a  jury  is  de 
manded,  with  all  the  safeguards  that  secure  an  accused  person 
against  judicial  blunders  and  judicial  bias.  The  necessity  for 
these  safeguards  is  even  greater  in  cases  of  contempt  than 
in  others — particularly  if  the  prosecuting  witness  is  to  sit  in 
judgment  on  his  own  grievance.  That  should,  of  course, 
not  be  permitted:  the  trial  should  take  place  before  another 
judge. 

Why  should  twelve  able-bodied  jurymen,  with  their  oaths 
to  guide  them  and  the  law  to  back,  submit  to  the  dictation  of 
one  small  judge  armed  with  nothing  better  than  an  insolent 
assumption  of  authority?  A  judge  has  not  the  moral  right  to 
order  a  jury  to  acquit,  the  utmost  that  he  can  rightly  do  is  to 
point  out  what  state  of  the  law  or  facts  may  seem  to  him  un 
favorable  to  conviction.  If  the  jurors,  holding  a  different  view, 
persist  in  conviction  the  accused  will  have  grounds,  doubtless, 
for  a  new  trial.  But  under  no  circumstances  is  a  judge  justified  in 
requiring  a  responsible  human  being  to  disregard  the  solemn 
obligation  of  an  oath. 

The  public  ear  is  dowered  with  rather  more  than  just 
enough  of  clotted  nonsense  about  "attacks  upon  the  dignity  of 
the  Bench,"  "bringing  the  judiciary  into  disrepute"  and  the 
rueful  rest  of  it.  I  crave  leave  to  remind  the  solicitudinarians 
sounding  these  loud  alarums  on  their  several  larynges  that  by 
persons  of  understanding  men  are  respected,  not  for  what  they 

74 


Some  Features  of  the  Law 


do,  but  for  what  they  are,  and  that  one  public  functionary  will 
stand  as  high  in  their  esteem  as  another  if  as  high  in  character. 
The  dignity  of  a  wise  and  righteous  judge  needs  not  the 
artificial  safeguarding  which  is  a  heritage  of  the  old  days  when 
if  dissent  found  a  tongue  the  public  executioner  cut  it  out.  The 
Bench  will  be  sufficiently  respected  when  it  is  no  longer  a  place 
where  dullards  dream  and  rogues  rob — when  its  personnel 
is  no  longer  chosen  in  the  back-rooms  of  tipple-shops,  forced 
upon  yawning  conventions  and  confirmed  by  the  votes  of  men 
who  neither  know  what  the  candidates  are  nor  what  they 
should  be.  With  the  gang  that  we  have  and  under  our  system 
must  continue  to  have,  respect  is  out  of  the  question  and  ought 
to  be.  They  are  entitled  to  just  as  much  of  its  forms  and 
observances  as  are  needful  to  maintenance  of  order  in  their 
courts  and  fortification  of  their  lawful  power — no  more.  As 
to  their  silence  under  criticism,  that  is  as  they  please.  No 
body  but  themselves  is  holding  their  tongues. 

II. 

A  law  under  which  the  unsuccessful  respondent  in  a  divorce 
proceeding  may  be  forbidden  to  marry  again  during  the  life 
of  the  successful  complainant,  the  latter  being  subject  to  no 
such  disability,  is  infamous  infinitely.  If  the  disability  is  in 
tended  as  a  punishment  it  is  exceptional  among  legal  punish 
ments  in  that  it  is  inflicted  without  conviction,  trial  or  arraign 
ment,  the  divorce  proceedings  being  quite  another  and  different 
matter.  It  is  exceptional  in  that  the  period  of  its  continuance, 
and  therefore  the  degree  of  its  severity,  are  indeterminate ;  they 
are  dependent  on  no  limiting  statute,  and  on  neither  the  will  of 
the  power  inflicting  nor  the  conduct  of  the  person  suffering. 

75 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

To  sentence  a  person  to  a  punishment  that  is  to  be  mild  or 
severe  according  to  chance  or — which  is  even  worse — circum 
stance,  which  but  one  person,  and  that  person  not  officially  con 
nected  with  administration  of  justice,  can  but  partly  control,  is 
a  monstrous  perversion  of  the  main  principles  that  are  supposed 
to  underlie  the  laws. 

In  "the  case  at  bar"  it  can  be  nothing  to  the  woman — 
possibly  herself  remarried — whether  the  man  remarries  or  not; 
that  is,  can  affect  only  her  feelings,  and  only  such  of  them  as 
are  least  creditable  to  her.  Yet  her  self-interest  is  enlisted 
against  him  to  do  him  incessant  dis-service.  By  merely  caring 
for  her  health  she  increases  the  sharpness  of  his  punishment — 
for  punishment  it  is  if  he  feels  it  such;  every  hour  that  she 
wrests  from  death  is  added  to  his  "term."  The  expediency  of 
preventing  a  man  from  marrying,  without  having  the  power  to 
prevent  him  from  making  his  marriage  desirable  in  the  interest 
of  the  public  and  vital  to  that  of  some  woman,  is  not  discuss 
able  here.  If  a  man  is  ever  justified  in  poisoning  a  woman  who 
is  no  longer  his  wife  it  is  when,  by  way  of  making  him  miser 
able,  the  State  has  given  him,  or  he  supposes  it  to  have  given 
him,  a  direct  and  distinct  interest  in  her  death. 

III. 

With  a  view,  possibly,  to  promoting  respect  for  law  by 
making  the  statutes  so  conform  to  public  sentiment  that  none 
will  fall  into  disesteem  and  disuse,  it  has  been  advocated  that 
there  be  a  formal  recognition  of  sex  in  the  penal  code,  by 
making  a  difference  in  the  punishment  of  men  and  of  women 
for  the  same  crimes  and  misdemeanors.  The  argument  is  that 
if  women  were  "provided"  with  milder  punishment  juries  would 

76 


Some  Features  of  the  Law 


sometimes  convict  them,  whereas  they  now  commonly  get  off 
altogether. 

The  plan  is  not  so  new  as  might  be  thought.  Many  of  the 
nations  of  antiquity  of  whose  laws  we  have  knowledge,  and 
nearly  all  the  European  nations  until  within  a  comparatively 
recent  time,  punished  women  differently  from  men  for  the  same 
offenses.  And  as  recently  as  the  period  of  the  Early  Puritan 
in  New  England  women  were  punished  for  some  offenses  which 
men  might  commit  without  fear  if  not  without  reproach.  The 
ducking-stool,  for  example,  was  an  appliance  for  softening  the 
female  temper  only.  In  England  women  used  to  be  burned  at 
the  stake  for  crimes  for  which  men  were  hanged,  roasting  being 
regarded  as  the  milder  punishment.  In  point  of  fact,  it  was  not 
punishment  at  all,  the  victim  being  carefully  strangled  before 
the  fire  touched  her.  Burning  was  simply  a  method  of  dis 
posing  of  the  body  so  expeditiously  as  to  give  no  occasion  and 
opportunity  for  the  unseemly  social  rites  commonly  performed 
about  the  scaffold  of  the  erring  male  by  the  jocular  populace. 
As  lately  as  1  763  a  woman  named  Margaret  Biddingfield 
was  burned  in  Suffolk  as  an  accomplice  in  the  crime  of  "petty 
treason."  She  had  assisted  in  the  murder  of  her  husband,  the 
actual  killing  being  done  by  a  man ;  and  he  was  hanged,  as  no 
doubt  he  richly  deserved.  For  "coining,"  too  (which  was 
"treason"),  men  were  hanged  and  women  burned.  This  dis 
tinction  between  the  sexes  was  maintained  until  the  year  of 
grace  1  790,  after  which  female  offenders  ceased  to  have  "a 
stake  in  the  country,"  and  like  Hood's  martial  hero,  "enlisted 
in  the  line." 

In  still  earlier  days,  before  the  advantages  of  fire  were 
understood,  our  good  grandmothers  who  sinned  were  admon 
ished  by  water — they  were  drowned ;  but  in  the  reign  of  Henry 

77 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

III  a  woman  was  hanged — without  strangulation,  apparently, 
for  after  a  whole  day  of  it  she  was  cut  down  and  pardoned. 
Sorceresses  and  unfaithful  wives  were  smothered  in  mud,  as 
also  were  unfaithful  wives  among  the  ancient  Burgundians. 
The  punishment  of  unfaithful  husbands  is  not  of  record;  we 
only  know  that  there  were  no  austerely  virtuous  editors  to  direct 
the  finger  of  public  scorn  their  way. 

Among  the  Anglo-Saxons,  women  who  had  the  bad  luck  to 
be  detected  in  theft  were  drowned,  while  men  meeting  with  the 
same  mischance  died  a  dry  death  by  hanging.  By  the  early 
Danish  laws  female  thieves  were  buried  alive,  whether  or  not 
from  motives  of  humanity  is  not  now  known.  This  seems  to 
have  been  the  fashion  in  France  also,  for  in  1331  a  woman 
named  Duplas  was  scourged  and  buried  alive  at  Abbeville, 
and  in  1460  Perotte  Mauger,  a  receiver  of  stolen  goods,  was 
inhumed  by  order  of  the  Provost  of  Paris  in  front  of  the  public 
gibbet.  In  Germany  in  the  good  old  days  certain  kinds  of 
female  criminals  were  "impaled,"  a  punishment  too  grotesquely 
horrible  for  description,  but  likely  enough  considered  by  the 
simple  German  of  the  period  conspicuously  merciful. 

It  is,  in  short,  only  recently  that  the  civilized  nations 
have  placed  the  sexes  on  an  equality  in  the  matter  of  the  death 
penalty  for  crime,  and  the  new  system  is  not  yet  by  any  means 
universal.  That  it  is  a  better  system  than  the  old,  or  would 
be  if  enforced,  is  a  natural  presumption  from  human  progress, 
out  of  which  it  is  evolved.  But  coincidently  with  its  evolution 
has  evolved  also  a  sentiment  adverse  to  punishment  of  women 
at  all.  But  this  sentiment  appears  to  be  of  independent  growth 
and  in  no  way  a  reaction  against  that  which  caused  the  change. 
To  mitigate  the  severity  of  the  death  penalty  for  women  to 
some  pleasant  form  of  euthanasia,  such  as  drowning  in  rose- 

78 


Some  Features  of  the  Law 


water,  or  in  their  case  to  abolish  the  death  penalty  altogether 
and  make  their  capital  punishment  consist  in  a  brief  interment 
in  a  jail  with  a  softened  name,  would  probably  do  no  good,  for 
whatever  form  it  might  take,  it  would  be,  so  far  as  woman  is 
concerned,  the  "extreme  penalty"  and  crowning  disgrace,  and 
jurors  would  be  as  reluctant  to  inflict  it  as  they  now  are  to 
inflict  hanging. 

IV. 

Testators  should  not,  from  the  snug  security  of  the  grave, 
utter  a  perpetual  threat  of  disinheritance  or  any  other  uncom 
fortable  fate  to  deter  an  American  citizen,  even  one  of  his  own 
legatees,  from  applying  to  the  courts  of  his  country  for  redress 
of  any  wrong  from  which  he  might  consider  himself  as  suffering. 
The  courts  of  law  ought  to  be  open  to  any  one  conceiving  him 
self  a  victim  of  injustice,  and  it  should  be  unlawful  to  abridge 
the  right  of  complaint  by  making  its  exercise  more  hazardous 
than  it  naturally  is.  Doubtless  the  contesting  of  wills  is  a  nuis 
ance,  generally  speaking,  the  contestant  conspicuously  devoid 
of  moral  worth  and  the  verdict  singularly  unrighteous;  but  as 
long  as  some  testators  really  are  daft,  or  subject  to  interested 
suasion,  or  wantonly  sinful,  they  should  be  denied  the  power  to 
stifle  dissent  by  fining  the  luckless  dissenter.  The  dead  have  too 
much  to  say  in  this  world  at  the  best,  and  it  is  monstrous  and 
intolerable  tyranny  for  them  to  stand  at  the  door  of  the  Temple 
of  Justice  to  drive  away  the  suitors  that  themselves  have  made. 

Obedience  to  the  commands  of  the  dead  should  be  con 
ditional  upon  their  good  behavior,  and  it  is  not  good  behavior 
to  set  up  a  censure  of  actions  at  law  among  the  living.  If  our 
courts  are  not  competent  to  say  what  actions  are  proper  to  be 
brought  and  what  are  unfit  to  be  entertained  let  us  improve  them 

79 


The  Shadow  on   the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

until  they  are  competent,  or  abolish  them  altogether  and  re 
sort  to  the  mild  and  humane  arbitrament  of  the  dice.  But  while 
courts  have  the  civility  to  exist  they  should  refuse  to  surrender 
any  part  of  their  duties  and  responsibilities  to  such  exceedingly 
private  persons  as  those  under  six  feet  of  earth,  or  sealed  up  in 
habitations  of  hewn  stone.  Persons  no  longer  affectible  by 
human  events  should  be  denied  a  voice  in  determining  the 
character  and  trend  of  them.  Respect  for  the  wishes  of  the 
dead  is  a  tender  and  beautiful  sentiment,  certainly.  Unfor 
tunately,  it  can  not  be  ascertained  that  they  have  any  wishes. 
What  commonly  go  by  that  name  are  wishes  once  entertained 
by  living  persons  who  are  now  dead,  and  who  in  dying  re 
nounced  them,  along  with  everything  else.  Like  those  who 
entertained  them,  the  wishes  are  no  longer  in  existence.  "The 
wishes  of  the  dead,"  therefore,  are  not  wishes,  and  are  not  of 
the  dead.  Why  they  should  have  anything  more  than  a 
sentimental  influence  upon  those  still  in  the  flesh,  and  be  a  fac 
tor  to  be  reckoned  with  in  the  practical  affairs  of  the  super- 
graminous  world,  is  a  question  to  which  the  merely  human 
understanding  can  find  no  answer,  and  it  must  be  referred  to  the 
lawyers.  When  "from  the  tombs  a  doleful  sound'*  is  vented, 
and  "thine  ear"  is  invited  to  "attend  the  cry,"  an  intelligent 
forethought  will  suggest  that  you  inquire  if  it  is  anything  about 
property.  If  so  pass  on — that  is  no  sacred  spot. 

V. 

Much  of  the  testimony  in  French  courts,  civil  and  martial, 
appears  to  consist  of  personal  impressions  and  opinions  of  the 
witnesses.  All  very  improper  and  mischievous,  no  doubt,  if — if 
what?  Why,  obviously,  if  the  judges  are  unfit  to  sit  in 

80 


Some  Features  of  the  Law 


judgment.  By  designating  them  to  sit  the  designating  power 
assumes  their  fitness — assumes  that  they  know  enough  to  take 
such  things  for  what  they  are  worth,  to  make  the  necessary  al 
lowances  ;  if  needful,  to  disregard  a  witness's  opinion  altogether. 
I  do  not  know  if  they  are  fit.  I  do  not  know  that  they  do 
make  the  needful  allowances.  It  is  by  no  means  clear  to  me 
that  any  judge  or  juror,  French,  American  or  Patagonian, 
is  competent  to  ascertain  the  truth  when  lying  witnesses  are 
trying  to  conceal  it  under  the  direction  of  skilled  and  conscien- 
tiousless  attorneys  licensed  to  deceive.  But  his  competence  is 
a  basic  assumption  of  the  law  vesting  him  with  the  duty  of 
deciding.  Having  chosen  him  for  that  duty  the  French  law 
very  logically  lets  him  alone  to  decide  for  himself  what  is 
evidence  and  what  is  not.  It  does  not  trust  him  a  little  but 
altogether.  It  puts  him  under  conditions  familiar  to  him — 
makes  him  accessible  to  just  such  influences  and  suasions  as  he 
is  accustomed  to  when  making  conscious  and  unconscious  de 
cisions  in  his  personal  affairs. 

There  may  be  a  distinct  gain  to  justice  in  permitting  a 
witness  to  say  whatever  he  wants  to  say.  If  he  is  telling  the 
truth  he  will  not  contradict  himself ;  if  he  is  lying  the  more  rope 
he  is  given  the  more  surely  he  will  entangle  himself.  To  the 
service  of  that  end  defendants  and  prisoners  should,  I  think, 
be  compelled  to  testify  and  denied  the  advantage  of  declining  to 
answer,  for  silence  is  the  refuge  of  guilt.  In  endeavoring  by 
austere  means  to  make  an  accused  person  incriminate  himself 
the  French  judge  logically  applies  the  same  principle  that  a 
parent  uses  with  a  suspected  child.  When  the  Grandfather  of 
His  Country  arraigned  the  wee  George  Washington  for  arbor- 
icide  the  accused  was  not  carefully  instructed  that  he  need  not 
answer  if  a  truthful  answer  would  tend  to  convict  him.  If 

81 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

he  had  refused  to  answer  he  would  indubitably  have  been 
lambasted  until  he  did  answer,  as  right  richly  he  would  have 
deserved  to  be. 

The  custom  of  permitting  a  witness  to  wander  at  will  over 
the  entire  field  of  knowledge,  hearsay,  surmise  and  opinion 
has  several  distinct  advantages  over  our  practice.  In  giving 
hearsay  evidence,  for  example,  he  may  suggest  a  new  and 
important  witness  of  whom  the  counsel  for  the  other  side  would 
not  otherwise  have  heard,  and  who  can  then  be  brought  into 
court.  On  some  unguarded  and  apparently  irrelevant  state 
ment  he  may  open  an  entirely  new  line  of  inquiry,  or  throw 
upon  the  case  a  flood  of  light.  Everyone  knows  what  revela 
tions  are  sometimes  evoked  by  apparently  the  most  insignifi 
cant  remarks.  Why  should  justice  be  denied  a  chance  to  profit 
that  way? 

There  is  a  still  greater  advantage  in  the  French  "method." 
By  giving  a  witness  free  rein  in  expression  of  his  personal  opin 
ions  and  feelings  we  should  be  able  to  calculate  his  frame 
of  mind,  his  good  or  ill  will  to  the  prosecution  or  defense  and, 
therefore,  to  a  certain  extent  his  credibility.  In  our  courts  he 
is  able  by  a  little  solemn  perjury  to  conceal  all  this,  even  from 
himself,  and  pose  as  an  impartial  witness,  when  in  truth,  with 
regard  to  the  accused,  he  is  full  of  rancor  or  reeking  with 
compassion. 

In  theory  our  system  is  perfect.  The  accused  is  prosecuted 
by  a  public  officer,  who  having  no  interest  in  his  conviction, 
will  serve  the  State  without  mischievous  zeal  and  perform  his 
disagreeable  task  with  fairness  and  consideration.  He  is  per 
mitted  to  entrust  his  defense  to  another  officer,  whose  duty  it  is 
to  make  a  rigidly  truthful  and  candid  presentation  of  his  case 
in  order  to  assist  the  court  to  a  just  decision.  The  jurors,  if 

82 


Some  Features  of  the  Latv 


there  are  jurors,  are  neither  friendly  nor  hostile,  are  open- 
minded,  intelligent  and  conscientious.  As  to  the  witnesses,  are 
they  not  sworn  to  tell  the  truth,  the  whole  truth  (in  so  far  as  they 
are  permitted)  and  nothing  but  the  truth?  What  could  be 
finer  and  better  than  all  this? — what  could  more  certainly 
assure  justice?  How  close  the  resemblance  is  between  this 
ideal  picture  and  what  actually  occurs  all  know,  or  should 
know.  The  judge  is  commonly  an  ignoramus  incapable  of 
logical  thought  and  with  little  sense  of  the  dread  and  awful 
nature  of  his  responsibility.  The  prosecuting  attorney  thinks 
it  due  to  his  reputation  to  "make  a  record"  and  tries  to  convict 
by  hook  or  crook,  even  when  he  is  himself  persuaded  of  the 
defendant's  innocence.  Counsel  for  the  defense  is  equally  un 
scrupulous  for  acquittal,  and  both,  having  industriously  coached 
their  witnesses,  contend  against  each  other  in  deceiving  the 
court  by  every  artifice  of  which  they  are  masters.  Witnesses 
on  both  sides  perjure  themselves  freely  and  with  almost  perfect 
immunity  if  detected.  At  the  close  of  it  all  the  poor  weary 
jurors,  hopelessly  bewildered  and  dumbly  resentful  of  their 
duping,  render  a  random  or  compromise  verdict,  or  one  which 
best  expresses  their  secret  animosity  to  the  lawyer  they  like 
least  or  their  faith  in  the  newspapers  which  they  have  diligently 
and  disobediently  read  every  night.  Commenting  upon 
Rabelais'  old  judge  who,  when  impeached  for  an  outrageous 
decision,  pleaded  his  defective  eye-sight  which  made  him  mis 
count  the  spots  on  the  dice,  the  most  distinguished  lawyer  of 
my  acquaintance  seriously  assured  me  that  if  all  the  cases  with 
which  he  had  been  connected  had  been  decided  with  the  dice 
substantial  justice  would  have  been  done  more  frequently  than 
it  was  done.  If  that  is  true,  or  nearly  true,  and  I  believe  it, 

83 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

the  American's  right  to  sneer  at  the  Frenchman's  "judicial 
methods"  is  still  an  open  question. 

It  is  urged  that  the  corrupt  practices  in  our  courts  of  law  be 
uncovered  to  public  view,  whenever  that  is  possible,  by  that 
impeccable  censor,  the  press.  Exposure  of  rascality  is  very 
good — better,  apparently  for  rascals  than  for  anybody  else,  for 
it  usually  suggests  something  rascally  which  they  had  over 
looked,  and  so  familiarizes  the  public  with  crime  that  crime  no 
longer  begets  loathing.  If  the  newspapers  of  the  country  are 
really  concerned  about  corrupter  practices  than  their  own  and 
willing  to  bring  our  courts  up  to  the  English  standard  there 
is  something  better  than  exposure — which  fatigues.  Let  the 
newspapers  set  about  creating  a  public  opinion  favorable  to 
non-elective  judges,  well  paid,  powerful  to  command  respect 
and  holding  office  for  life  or  good  behavior.  That  is  the 
only  way  to  get  good  men  and  great  lawyers  on  the  Bench. 
As  matters  are,  we  stand  and  cry  for  what  the  English  have 
and  rail  at  the  way  they  get  it.  Our  boss-made,  press-ridden 
and  mob-fearing  paupers  and  ignoramuses  of  the  Bench  give  us 
as  good  a  quality  of  justice  as  we  merit.  A  better  quality 
awaits  us  whenever  the  will  to  have  it  is  attended  by  the  sense 
to  take  it. 


84 


Arbitration 


Arbitration 


HE  universal  cry  for  arbitration  is  either  dis 
honest  or  unwise.  For  every  evil  there  are 
quack  remedies  galore — especially  for  every 
evil  that  is  irremediable.  Of  this  order  of 
remedies  is  arbitration,  for  of  this  order  of  evils  is  the  in 
adequate  wage  of  manual  labor.  Since  the  beginning  of 
authentic  history  everything  has  been  tried  in  the  hope  of  divorc 
ing  poverty  and  labor,  but  nothing  has  parted  them.  It  is  not 
conceivable  that  anything  ever  will;  success  of  arbitration, 
antecedently  improbable,  is  demonstrably  impossible.  Most  of 
the  work  of  the  world  is  hard,  disagreeable  work,  requiring 
little  intelligence.  Most  of  the  people  of  the  world  are  unin 
telligent — unfit  to  do  any  other  work.  If  it  were  not  done  by 
them  it  would  not  be  done,  and  it  is  the  basic  work.  With 
draw  them  from  it  and  the  whole  superstructure  would  topple 
and  fall.  Yet  there  is  too  little  of  the  work,  and  there  are  so 
many  incapable  of  doing  anything  else  that  adequate  return  is 
out  of  the  question.  For  the  laboring  class  there  is  no  hope  of 
an  existence  that  is  comfortable  in  comparison  with  that  of 
the  other  class;  the  hope  of  an  individual  laborer  lies  in  the 
possibility  of  fitting  himself  for  higher  employment — employ 
ment  of  the  head;  not  manual  but  cerebral  labor.  While  sel 
fishness  remains  the  main  ingredient  of  human  nature  (and  a 
survey  of  the  centuries  accessible  to  examination  shows  but  a 
slow  and  intermittent  decrease)  the  cerebral  workers,  being 

87 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

the  wiser  and  no  better,  will  manage  to  take  the  greater  profit. 
In  justice  it  must  be  said  of  them  that  they  extend  a  warm  and 
sincere  invitation  to  their  ranks,  and  take  "apprentices;"  every 
chance  of  education  that  the  other  class  enjoys  is  proof  of  that. 

All  this  is  perhaps  a  trifle  abstruse;  let  us,  then,  look  at 
arbitration  more  nearly ;  in  our  time  it  is,  in  form  at  least,  some 
thing  new.  It  began  as  "international  arbitration,"  which 
already,  in  settling  a  few  disputes  of  no  great  importance,  has 
shown  itself  a  dangerous  remedy.  In  the  necessary  negotiation 
to  determine  exactly  what  points  to  submit,  to  whom,  and  how, 
and  where,  and  when  to  submit  them,  and  how  to  carry  out 
the  arbitrator's  decision,  scores  of  questions  are  raised,  upon 
each  of  which  it  is  as  easy  to  disagree  and  fight  as  upon  the 
original  issue.  International  arbitration  may  be  defined  as  the 
substitution  of  many  burning  questions  for  a  smouldering  one; 
for  disputes  that  have  reached  a  really  acute  stage  are  not  sub 
mitted.  The  animosities  that  it  has  kindled  have  been  hotter 
than  those  it  has  quenched. 

Industrial  arbitration  is  no  better;  it  is  manifestly  worse, 
and  any  law  enforcing  it,  and  enforcing  compliance  with  its 
decisions,  is  absurd  and  mischievous.  "Compulsory  arbitra 
tion"  is  not  arbitration,  the  essence  whereof  is  voluntary  sub 
mission  of  differences  and  voluntary  submission  to  judgment. 
If  either  reference  or  obedience  is  enforced  the  arbitrators  are 
simply  a  court  with  no  powers  to  do  anything  but  apply  the 
law.  Proponents  of  the  fad  would  do  well  to  consider  this: 
If  a  party  to  a  labor  dispute  is  compelled  to  invoke  and  obey 
a  decision  of  arbitrators  that  decision  must  follow  strictly  the 
line  of  law;  the  smallest  invasion  of  any  constitutional,  statutory 
or  common-law  right  will  enable  him  to  upset  the  whole  judg 
ment.  No  legislative  body  can  establish  a  tribunal  empowered 


Arbitration 


to  make  and  enforce  illegal  or  extra  legal  decisions;  for 
making  and  enforcing  legal  ones  the  tribunals  that  we  already 
have  are  sufficient.  This  talk  of  "compulsory  arbitration"  is 
the  maddest  nonsense  that  the  industrial  situation  has  yet 
evolved.  Doubtless  it  is  sent  upon  us  for  our  sins ;  but  had  we 
not  already  a  plague  of  inveracity? 

Arbitration  of  labor  disputes  means  compromise  with  the 
unions.  It  can,  in  this  country,  mean  nothing  else,  for  the  law 
would  not  survive  a  half-dozen  failures  to  concede  some  part  of 
their  demands,  however  reasonless.  By  repeated  strikes  they 
would  eventually  get  all  their  original  demand  and  as  much 
more  as  on  second  thought  they  might  choose  to  ask  for.  Each 
concession  would  be,  as  it  is  now,  followed  by  a  new  demand, 
and  the  first  arbitrators  might  as  well  allow  them  all  that  they 
demand  and  all  that  they  mean  to  demand  hereafter. 

Would  not  employers  be  equally  unscrupulous?  They 
would  not.  They  could  not  afford  the  disturbance,  the  stoppage 
of  the  business,  the  risk  of  unfair  decisions  in  a  country  where 
it  is  "popular"  to  favor  and  encourage,  not  the  just,  but  the 
poor.  The  labor  leaders  have  nothing  to  lose,  not  even  their 
jobs,  for  their  work  is  labor  leading.  Their  dupes,  by  the  way, 
would  be  dupes  no  longer,  for  with  enforced  arbitration  the 
game  of  "follow  my  leader"  would  pay  until  there  should  be 
nothing  to  follow  him  to  but  empty  treasuries  of  dead  in 
dustries  in  an  extinct  civilization.  If  there  must  be  enforced 
arbitration  it  should  at  least  not  apply  to  that  sum  of  all 
impudent  rascalities,  the  "sympathetic  strike." 

As  to  the  men  who  have  set  up  the  monstrous  claim  asserted 
by  the  "sympathetic  strike,"  I  shall  refer  to  the  affair  of  1904. 
If  it  was  creditable  in  them  to  feel  so  much  concern  about  a  few 
hundred  aliens  in  Illinois,  how  about  the  grievances  of  the 

89 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

whole  body  of  their  countrymen  in  California?  When  their 
employers,  who  they  confess  were  good  to  them,  were  plunder 
ing  the  Californians,  they  did  not  strike,  sympathetically  nor 
otherwise.  Year  after  year  the  railway  companies  picked  the 
pockets  of  the  Californians;  corrupted  their  courts  and  legisla 
tures;  laid  its  Briarean  hands  in  exaction  upon  every  industry 
and  interest ;  filled  the  land  with  lies  and  false  reasoning ;  threw 
honest  men  into  prisons  and  locked  the  gates  of  them  against 
thieves  and  assassins;  by  open  defiance  of  the  tax  collector 
denied  to  children  of  the  poor  the  advantages  of  education — did 
all  this  and  more,  and  these  honest  working  men  stood  loyally 
by  it,  sharing  in  wages  its  dishonest  gains,  receivers,  in  one 
sense,  of  stolen  goods.  The  groans  of  their  neighbors  were 
nothing  to  them;  even  the  wrongs  of  themselves,  their  wives 
and  their  children  did  not  stir  them  to  revolt.  On  every 
breeze  that  blew,  this  great  chorus  of  cries  and  curses  was 
borne  past  their  ears  unheeded.  Why  did  they  not  strike  then? 
Where  then  were  their  fiery  altruists  and  storm-petrels  of  in 
dustrial  disorder?  No! — the  ingenious  gods  who  have  invented 
the  Debses  and  Gomperses,  and  humorously  branded  them 
with  names  that  would  make  a  cat  laugh,  have  never  put  it 
into  their  cold  selfish  hearts  to  order  out  their  misguided 
followers  to  redress  a  public  wrong,  but  only  to  inflict  one — to 
avenge  a  personal  humiliation,  gratify  an  appetite  for  notoriety, 
slake  a  thirst  for  the  intoxicating  cup  of  power,  or  punish  the 
crime  of  prosperity. 

It  is  a  practical,  an  illogical,  a  turbulent  time,  yes;  it 
always  is.  The  age  of  Jesus  Christ  was  a  practical  age,  yet 
Jesus  Christ  was  sweetly  impractical.  In  an  illogical  period 
Socrates  reasoned  clearly,  and  logically  died  for  it.  Nero's 
time  was  a  time  of  turbulence,  yet  Seneca's  mind  was  not  dis- 

90 


Arbitration 


turbed,  nor  his  conscience  perverted.  Compare  their  fame  with 
the  everlasting  infamy  that  time  has  fixed  upon  the  names  of 
the  Jack  Cades,  the  Robespierres,  the  Tomaso  Nielos — guides 
and  gods  of  the  "fierce  democracies"  which  rise  with  a  sicken 
ing  periodicity  to  defile  the  page  of  history  with  a  quickly  fad 
ing  mark  of  blood  and  fire,  their  own  awful  example  their  sole 
contribution  to  the  good  of  mankind.  To  be  a  child  of  your 
time,  imbued  with  its  spirit  and  endowed  with  its  aims — that  is 
to  petition  Posterity  for  a  niche  in  the  Temple  of  Shame. 

No  strike  of  any  prominence  ever  takes  place  in  this  country 
without  the  concomitants  of  violence  and  destruction  of  pro 
perty,  and  usually  murder.  These  cheerful  incidents  one  who 
does  not  personally  suffer  them  can  endure  with  considerable 
fortitude,  but  the  sniveling,  hypocritical  condemnation  of  them 
by  the  press  that  has  instigated  them  and  the  strikers  who  have 
planned  and  executed  them,  and  who  invariably  ascribe  them 
to  those  whom  they  most  injure ;  the  solemn  offers  of  the  leaders 
to  assist  in  protecting  the  imperiled  property  and  avenging 
the  dead,  while  openly  employing  counsel  for  every  incendiary 
and  assassin  arrested  in  spite  of  them — these  are  pretty  hard  to 
bear.  A  strike  means  (for  it  includes  as  its  main  method) 
violence,  lawlessness,  destruction  of  the  property  of  others  than 
the  strikers,  riot  and  if  necessary  bloodshed.  Even  when  the 
strikers  themselves  have  no  hand  in  these  crimes  they  are 
morally  liable  for  the  foreknown  consequences  of  their  act. 
Nay,  they  are  morally  liable  for  all  the  consequences — all  the 
inconveniences  and  losses  to  the  community,  all  the  sufferings  of 
the  poor  entailed  by  interruptions  of  trade,  all  the  privations  of 
other  workingmen  whom  a  selfish  attention  to  their  own  sup 
posed  advantage  throws  out  of  the  closed  industries.  They  are 
liable  in  morals  and  should  be  made  so  in  law — only  that 

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The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

strikes  are  needless.  It  is  not  worth  while  to  create  a  multitude 
of  complex  criminal  responsibilities  for  acts  which  can  easily 
be  prevented  by  a  single  and  simple  one.  How? 

First,  I  should  like  to  point  out  that  we  are  hearing  a  deal 
too  much  about  a  man's  inalienable  right  to  work  or  play,  at 
his  own  sovereign  will.  In  so  far  as  that  means — and  it  is 
always  used  to  mean — his  right  to  quit  any  kind  of  work  at 
any  moment,  without  notice  and  regardless  of  consequences  to 
others,  it  is  false;  there  is  no  such  moral  right,  and  the  law 
should  have  at  least  a  speaking  acquaintance  with  morality. 
What  is  mischievous  should  be  illegal.  The  various  interests 
of  civilization  are  so  complex,  delicate,  intertangled  and  inter 
dependent  that  no  man,  and  no  set  of  men,  should  have  power 
to  throw  the  entire  scheme  into  confusion  and  disorder  for  pro 
motion  of  a  trumpery  principle  or  a  class  advantage.  In  deal 
ing  with  corporations  we  recognize  that.  If  for  any  selfish 
purpose  the  trade  union  of  railway  managers  had  done  what 
their  sacred  brakemen  and  divine  firemen  did — had  decreed 
that  "no  wheel  should  turn"  until  Mr.  Pullman's  men  should 
return  to  work — they  would  have  found  themselves  all  in  jail 
the  second  day.  Their  right  to  quit  work  was  not  conceded: 
they  lacked  that  authenticating  credential  of  moral  and  legal 
irresponsibility,  an  indurated  palm.  In  a  small  lockout  affecting 
a  mill  or  two  the  offender  finds  a  half-hearted  support  in  the 
law  if  he  is  willing  to  pay  enough  deputy  sheriffs;  but  even 
then  he  is  mounted  by  the  hobnailed  populace,  at  its  back  the 
daily  newspapers,  clamoring  and  spitting  like  cats.  But  let 
the  manager  of  a  great  railway  discharge  all  its  men  without 
warning  and  "kill"  its  own  engines!  Then  see  what  you  will 
see.  To  commit  a  wrong  so  gigantic  with  impunity  a  man  must 
wear  overalls. 


Arbitration 


How  prevent  anybody  from  committing  it?  How  break  up 
this  regime  of  strikes  and  boycotts  and  lockouts,  more  dis 
astrous  to  others  than  to  those  at  whom  the  blows  are  aimed — 
than  to  those,  even,  who  deliver  them?  How  make  all  those 
concerned  in  the  management  and  operation  of  great  industries, 
about  which  have  grown  up  tangles  of  related  and  dependent 
interests,  conduct  them  with  some  regard  to  the  welfare  of 
others?  Before  committing  ourselves  to  the  dubious  and  irre 
traceable  course  of  "Government  ownership,"  or  to  the  in 
fectious  expedient  of  a  "pension  system,"  is  there  anything 
of  promise  yet  untried? — anything  of  superior  simplicity  and 
easier  application?  I  think  so.  Make  a  breach  of  labor  con 
tract  by  either  party  to  it  a  criminal  offense  punishable  by  im 
prisonment.  "Fine  or  imprisonment"  will  not  do — the  em 
ployee,  unable  to  pay  the  fine,  would  commonly  go  to  jail,  the 
employer  seldom.  That  would  not  be  fair. 

The  purpose  of  such  a  law  is  apparent:  Labor  contracts 
would  then  be  drawn  for  a  certain  time,  securing  both  em 
ployer  and  employee  and  (which  is  more  important)  helpless 
persons  in  related  and  dependent  industries — the  whole  public, 
in  fact — against  sudden  and  disastrous  action  by  either 
"capital"  or  "labor"  for  accomplishment  of  a  purely  selfish  or 
frankly  impudent  end.  A  strike  or  lockout  compelled  to 
announce  itself  thirty  days  in  advance  would  be  innocuous  to 
the  public,  whilst  securing  to  the  party  of  initiation  all  the 
advantages  that  anybody  professes  to  want — all  but  the 
advantage  of  ruining  others  and  of  successfully  defying  the 
laws. 

Under  the  present  regime  labor  contracts  are  useless ;  either 
party  can  violate  them  with  impunity.  They  offer  redress  only 
through  a  civil  suit  for  damages,  and  the  employee  commonly 

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The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

has  nothing  with  which  to  conduct  an  action  or  satisfy  a  judg 
ment.  The  consequence  is  seen  in  the  incessant  and  increasing 
industrial  disturbances,  with  their  ever-attendant  crimes  against 
property,  life  and  liberty — disturbances  which  by  driving 
capital  to  investments  in  which  it  needs  employ  no  labor, 
do  more  than  all  the  other  causes  so  glibly  enumerated  by  every 
newspaper  and  politician,  though  by  no  two  alike,  to  bring 
about  the  "hard  times" — which  in  their  turn  cause  further  and 
worse  disturbances. 


94 


Industrial 
Discontent 


Industrial  Discontent 


HE  time  seems  to  have  come  when  the  two 
antagonistic  elements  of  American  society  should, 
and  could  afford  to,  throw  off  their  disguise 
and  frankly  declare  their  principles  and  pur 
poses.  But  what,  it  may  be  asked,  are  the  two  antagonistic 
elements?  Dividing  lines  parting  the  population  into  two 
camps  more  or  less  hostile  may  be  drawn  variously;  for  ex 
ample,  one  may  be  run  between  the  law-abiding  and  the 
criminal  class.  But  the  elements  to  which  reference  is  here 
made  are  those  immemorable  and  implacable  foes  which  the 
slang  of  modern  economics  roughly  and  loosely  distinguishes 
as  "Capital"  and  "Labor."  A  more  accurate  classification — 
as  accurate  a  one  as  it  is  possible  to  make — would  designate 
them  as  those  who  do  muscular  labor  and  those  who  do  not. 
The  distinction  between  rich  and  poor  does  not  serve:  to  the 
laborer  the  rich  man  who  works  with  his  hands  is  not  objection 
able;  the  poor  man  who  does  not,  is.  Consciously  or  uncon 
sciously,  and  alike  by  those  whose  necessities  compel  them  to 
perform  it  and  those  whose  better  fortune  enables  them  to 
avoid  it,  manual  labor  is  considered  the  most  insufferable  of 
human  pursuits.  It  is  a  pill  that  the  Tolstois,  the  "com 
munities"  and  the  "Knights"  of  Labor  can  not  sugarcoat.  We 
may  prate  of  the  dignity  of  labor;  emblazon  its  praise  upon 
banners;  set  apart  a  day  on  which  to  stop  work  and  celebrate 
it;  shout  our  teeth  loose  in  its  glorification — and,  God  help  our 
fool  souls  to  better  sense,  we  think  we  mean  it  all ! 

If  labor  is  so  good  and  great  a  thing  let  all  be  thankful,  for 

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The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

all  can  have  as  much  of  it  as  may  be  desired.  The  eight-hour 
law  is  not  mandatory  to  the  laborer,  nor  does  possession  of 
leisure  entail  idleness.  It  is  permitted  to  the  clerk,  the  shop 
man,  the  street  peddler — to  all  who  live  by  the  light  employ 
ment  of  keeping  the  wolf  from  the  door  without  eating  him — 
to  abandon  their  ignoble  callings,  seize  the  shovel,  the  axe  and 
the  sledge-hammer  and  lay  about  them  right  sturdily,  to  the 
ample  gratification  of  their  desire.  And  those  who  are  engaged 
in  more  profitable  vocations  will  find  that  with  a  part  of  their 
incomes  they  can  purchase  from  their  employers  the  right  to 
work  as  hard  as  they  like  in  even  the  dullest  times. 

Manual  labor  has  nothing  of  dignity,  nothing  of  beauty.  It 
is  a  hard,  imperious  and  dispiriting  necessity.  He  who  is  con 
demned  to  it  feels  that  it  sets  upon  his  brow  the  brand  of  in 
tellectual  inferiority.  And  that  brand  of  servitude  never 
ceases  to  burn.  In  no  country  and  at  no  time  has  the  laborer 
had  a  kindly  feeling  for  the  rest  of  us,  for  everywhere  and 
always  has  he  heard  in  our  patronising  platitudes  the  note  of 
contempt.  In  his  repression,  in  the  denying  him  the  opportunity 
to  avenge  his  real  and  imaginary  wrongs,  government  finds  its 
main  usefulness,  activity  and  justification.  Jefferson's  dictum 
that  governments  are  instituted  among  men  in  order  to  secure 
them  in  "life,  liberty  and  the  pursuit  of  happiness"  is  luminous 
nonsense.  Governments  are  not  instituted;  they  grow.  They 
are  evolved  out  of  the  necessity  of  protecting  from  the  hand 
worker  the  life  and  property  of  the  brain  worker  and  the  idler. 
The  first  is  the  most  dangerous  because  the  most  numerous  and 
the  least  content.  Take  from  the  science  and  the  art  of 
government,  and  from  its  methods,  whatever  has  had  its  origin 
in  the  consciousness  of  his  ill-will  and  the  fear  of  his  power  and 

98 


Industrial  Discontent 


what  have  you  left?  A  pure  republic — that  is  to  say,  no 
government. 

I  should  like  it  understood  that,  if  not  absolutely  devoid 
of  preferences  and  prejudices,  I  at  least  believe  myself  to  be; 
that  except  as  to  result  I  think  no  more  of  one  form  of  govern 
ment  than  of  another;  and  that  with  reference  to  results  all 
forms  seem  to  me  bad,  but  bad  in  different  degrees.  If  asked 
my  opinion  as  to  the  results  of  our  own,  I  should  point  to  Home 
stead,  to  Wardner,  to  Buffalo,  to  Coal  Creek,  to  the  inter 
minable  tale  of  unpunished  murders  by  individuals  and  by 
mobs,  to  legislatures  and  courts  unspeakably  corrupt  and  ex 
ecutives  of  criminal  cowardice,  to  the  prevalence  and  immunity 
of  plundering  trusts  and  corporations  and  the  monstrous  mul 
tiplication  of  millionaires.  I  should  invite  attention  to  the  pen 
sion  roll,  to  the  similar  and  incredible  extravagance  of  Repub 
lican  and  Democratic  "Houses" — a  plague  o'  them  both!  If 
addressing  Democrats  only,  I  should  mention  the  protective 
tariff;  if  Republicans,  the  hill-tribe  clamor  for  free  coinage  of 
silver.  I  should  call  to  mind  the  existence  of  prosperous  activity 
of  a  thousand  lying  secret  societies  having  for  their  sole  object 
mitigation  of  republican  simplicity  by  means  of  pageantry  and 
costumes  grotesquely  resembling  those  of  kings  and  courtiers, 
and  titles  of  address  and  courtesy  exalted  enough  to  draw 
laughter  from  an  ox. 

In  contemplation  of  these  and  a  hundred  other  "results," 
no  less  shameful  in  themselves  than  significant  of  the  deeper 
shame  beneath  and  prophetic  of  the  blacker  shame  to  come,  I 
should  say:  "Behold  the  outcome  of  hardly  more  than  a 
century  of  government  by  the  people!  Behold  the  superstruc 
ture  whose  foundations  our  forefathers  laid  upon  the  unstable 

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The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

overgrowth  of  popular  caprice  surfacing  the  unplummeted 
abysm  of  human  depravity!  Behold  the  reality  behind  our 
dream  of  the  efficacy  of  forms,  the  saving  grace  of  principles, 
the  magic  of  words!  We  have  believed  in  the  wisdom  of 
majorities  and  are  fooled ;  trusted  to  the  good  honor  of  numbers, 
and  are  betrayed.  Our  touching  faith  in  the  liberty  of  the 
rascal,  our  strange  conviction  that  anarchy  making  proselytes 
and  bombs  is  less  dangerous  than  anarchy  with  a  shut  mouth 
and  a  watched  hand — lo,  this  is  the  beginning  of  the  end  of 
the  dream!" 

Our  no  Government  has  broken  down  at  every  point,  and 
the  two  irreconcilable  elements  whose  suspensions  of  hostilities 
are  mistaken  for  peace  are  about  to  try  their  hands  at  each 
other's  tempting  display  of  throats.  There  is  no  longer  so 
much  as  a  pretense  of  amity;  apparently  there  will  not  much 
longer  be  a  pretense  of  regard  for  mercy  and  morals.  Already 
"industrial  discontent*'  has  attained  to  the  magnitude  of  war. 
It  is  important,  then,  that  there  be  an  understanding  of  prin 
ciples  and  purposes.  As  the  combatants  will  not  define  their 
positions  truthfully  by  words,  let  us  see  if  it  can  be  inferred  from 
the  actions  which  are  said  to  speak  more  plainly.  If  one  of  the 
really  able  men  who  now  "direct  the  destinies"  of  the  labor 
organizations  in  this  country,  could  be  enticed  into  the  Palace 
of  Truth  and  "examined"  by  a  skilful  catechist  he  would  in 
dubitably  say  something  like  this: 

"Our  ultimate  purpose  is  abolition  of  the  distinction  be 
tween  employer  and  employee,  which  is  but  a  modification  of 
that  between  master  and  slave. 

"We  propose  that  the  laborer  shall  be  chief  owner  of  all 
the  property  and  profits  of  the  enterprise  in  which  he  is  engaged, 
and  have  through  his  union  a  controlling  voice  in  all  its  affairs. 

100 


Industrial  Discontent 


"We  propose  to  overthrow  the  system  under  which  a  man 
can  grow  richer  by  working  with  his  head  than  with  his  hands, 
and  prevent  the  man  who  works  with  neither  from  having  any 
thing  at  all. 

"In  the  attainment  of  these  ends  any  means  is  to  be  judged, 
as  to  its  fitness  for  our  use,  with  sole  regard  to  its  efficacy.  We 
shall  punish  the  innocent  for  the  sins  of  the  guilty.  We  shall 
destroy  property  and  life  under  such  circumstances  and  to  such 
an  extent  as  may  seem  to  us  expedient.  Falsehood,  treachery, 
arson,  assassination,  all  these  we  look  upon  as  legitimate  if 
effective. 

"The  rules  of  'civilized  warfare'  we  shall  not  observe,  but 
shall  put  prisoners  to  death  or  torture  them,  as  we  please. 

"We  do  not  recognize  a  non-union  man's  right  to  labor, 
nor  to  live.  The  right  to  strike  includes  the  right  to  strike  him." 

Doubtless  all  that  (and  "the  half  is  not  told")  sounds  to 
the  unobservant  like  a  harsh  exaggeration,  an  imaginative 
travesty  of  the  principles  of  labor  organizations.  It  is  not  a 
travesty;  it  has  no  element  of  exaggeration.  Not  in  the  last 
twenty-five  years  has  a  great  strike  or  lockout  occurred  in  this 
country  without  supplying  facts,  notorious  and  undisputed, 
upon  which  some  of  these  confessions  of  faith  are  founded. 
The  war  is  practically  a  servile  insurrection,  and  servile  insur 
rections  are  today  what  they  ever  were:  the  most  cruel  and 
ferocious  of  all  manifestations  of  human  hate.  Emancipation 
is  rough  work ;  when  he  who  would  be  free,  himself  strikes  the 
blow,  he  can  not  consider  too  curiously  with  what  he  strikes 
it  nor  upon  whom  it  falls.  It  will  profit  you  to  understand,  my 
fine  gentleman  with  the  soft  hands,  the  character  of  that  which 
is  confronting  you.  You  are  not  threatened  with  a  bombard 
ment  of  roses. 

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The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

Let  us  look  into  the  other  camp,  where  General  Hardhead 
is  so  engrossed  with  his  own  greatness  and  power  as  not 
clearly  to  hear  the  shots  on  his  picket  line.  Suppose  we  hyp 
notize  him  and  make  him  open  his  "shut  soul"  to  our  searching. 
He  will  say  something  like  this: 

"In  the  first  place,  I  claim  the  right  to  own  and  enclose  for 
my  own  use  or  disuse  as  much  of  the  earth's  surface  as  I  am 
desirous  and  able  to  procure.  I  and  my  kind  have  made  laws 
confirming  us  in  the  occupancy  of  the  entire  habitable  and 
arable  area  as  fast  as  we  can  get  it.  To  the  objection  that 
this  must  eventually  here,  as  it  has  actually  done  elsewhere, 
deprive  the  rest  of  you  places  upon  which  legally  to  be  born, 
and  exclude  you  after  surreptitious  birth  as  trespassers  from  all 
chance  to  procure  directly  the  fruits  of  the  earth,  I  reply  that 
you  can  be  born  at  sea  and  eat  fish. 

"I  claim  the  right  to  induce  you,  by  offer  of  employment,  to 
colonize  yourselves  and  families  about  my  factories,  and  then 
arbitrarily,  by  withdrawing  the  employment,  break  up  in  a  day 
the  homes  that  you  have  been  years  in  acquiring  where  it  is  no 
longer  possible  for  you  to  procure  work. 

"In  determining  your  rate  of  wages  when  I  employ  you,  I 
claim  the  right  to  make  your  necessities  a  factor  in  the  problem, 
thus  making  your  misfortunes  cumulative.  By  the  law  of 
supply  and  demand  (God  bless  its  expounder!)  the  less  you 
have  and  the  less  chance  to  get  more,  the  more  I  have  the  right 
to  take  from  you  in  labor  and  the  less  I  am  bound  to  give  you 
in  wages. 

"I  claim  the  right  to  ignore  the  officers  of  the  peace  and 
maintain  a  private  army  to  subdue  you  when  you  rise. 

"I  claim  the  right  to  make  you  suffer,  by  creating  for  my 
advantage  an  artificial  scarcity  of  the  necessaries  of  life. 

102 


Industrial  Discontent 


"I  claim  the  right  to  employ  the  large  powers  of  the  govern 
ment  in  advancing  my  private  welfare. 

"As  to  falsehood,  treachery  and  the  other  military  virtues 
with  which  you  threaten  me,  I  shall  go,  in  them,  as  far  as  you; 
but  from  arson  and  assassination  I  recoil  with  horror.  You 
see  you  have  very  little  to  burn,  and  you  are  not  more  than  half 
alive  anyhow." 

That,  I  submit,  is  a  pretty  fair  definition  of  the  position 
of  the  wealthy  man  who  works  with  his  head.  It  seems  worth 
while  to  put  it  on  record  while  he  is  extant  to  challenge  or 
verify;  for  the  probability  is  that  unless  he  mend  his  ways 
he  will  not  much  longer  be  wealthy,  work,  nor  have  a  head. 

II. 

In  discussion  of  the  misdoings  at  Homestead  and  Coeur  d' 
Alene  it  is  amusing  to  observe  all  the  champions  of  law  and 
order  gravely  prating  of  "principles"  and  declaring  with  all 
the  solemnity  of  owls  that  these  sacred  things  have  been  vio 
lated.  On  that  ground  they  have  the  argument  all  their  own 
way.  Indubitably  there  is  hardly  a  fundamental  principle  of 
law  and  morals  that  the  rioting  laborers  have  not  footballed  out 
of  the  field  of  consideration.  Indubitably,  too,  in  doing  so 
they  have  forfeited  as  they  must  have  expected  to  forfeit,  all 
the  "moral  support"  for  which  they  did  not  care  a  tinker's  im 
precation.  If  there  were  any  question  of  their  culpability  this 
solemn  insistence  upon  it  would  lack  something  of  the  humor 
with  which  it  is  now  invested  and  which  saves  the  observer  from 
death  by  dejection. 

It  is  not  only  in  discussions  of  the  "labor  situation"  that  we 
hear  this  eternal  babble  of  "principles."  It  is  never  out  of  ear, 

103 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

and  in  politics  is  especially  clamant.  Every  success  in  an  elec 
tion  is  yawped  of  as  "a  triumph  of  Republican  (or  Demo 
cratic)  principles."  But  neither  in  politics  nor  in  the  quarrels 
of  laborers  and  their  employers  have  principles  a  place  as 
"factors  in  the  problem."  Their  use  is  to  supply  to  both  com 
batants  a  vocabulary  of  accusation  and  appeal.  All  the  fierce 
talk  of  an  antagonist's  violation  of  those  eternal  principles  upon 
which  organized  society  is  founded — and  the  rest  of  it — what 
is  it  but  the  cry  of  the  dog  with  the  chewed  ear?  The  dog 
that  is  chewing  foregoes  the  advantage  of  song. 

Human  contests  engaging  any  number  of  contestants  are 
not  struggles  of  principles  but  struggles  of  interests;  and  this  is 
no  less  true  of  those  decided  by  the  ballot  than  of  those  in 
which  the  franker  bullet  gives  judgment.  Nor,  but  from  con 
siderations  of  prudence  and  expediency,  will  either  party  hesi 
tate  to  transgress  the  limits  of  the  law  and  outrage  the  sense 
of  right.  At  Homestead  and  Wardner  the  laborers  committed 
robbery,  pillage  and  murder,  as  striking  workmen  invariably 
do  when  they  dare,  and  as  cowardly  newspapers  and  scoundrel 
politicians  encourage  them  in  doing.  But  what  would  you 
have?  They  conceive  it  to  be  to  their  interest  to  do  these 
things.  If  capitalists  conceive  it  to  be  to  theirs  they  too  would 
do  them.  They  do  not  do  them  for  their  interest  lies  in  the 
supremacy  of  the  law — under  which  they  can  suffer  loss  but 
do  not  suffer  hunger. 

"But  they  do  murder,"  say  the  labor  unions;  "they  bring 
in  gangs  of  armed  mercenaries  who  shoot  down  honest  work 
men  striving  for  their  rights."  This  is  the  baldest  nonsense,  as 
they  know  very  well  who  utter  it.  The  Pinkerton  men  are 
mere  mercenaries  and  have  no  right  place  in  our  system,  but 
there  have  been  no  instances  of  their  attacking  men  not  engaged 

104 


Industrial  Discontent 


in  some  unlawful  prank.  In  the  fight  at  Homestead  the  work 
men  were  actually  intrenched  on  premises  belonging  to  the  other 
side,  where  they  had  not  the  ghost  of  a  legal  right  to  be. 
American  working  men  are  not  fools;  they  know  well  enough 
when  they  are  rogues.  But  confession  is  not  among  the  military 
virtues,  and  the  question,  Is  roguery  expedient?  is  not  so  simple 
that  it  can  be  determined  by  asking  the  first  preacher  you  meet. 

It  would  be  very  nice  and  fine  all  round  if  idle  workmen 
would  not  riot  nor  idle  employers  meet  force  with  force,  but 
invoke  the  impossible  Sheriff.  When  the  Dragon  has  been 
chained  in  the  Bottomless  Pit  and  we  are  living  under  the  rule 
of  the  saints,  things  will  be  so  ordered,  but  in  these  rascal  times 
"revolutions  are  not  made  with  rosewater,"  and  this  is  a 
revolution.  What  is  being  revolutionized  is  the  relation 
between  our  old  friends,  Capital  and  Labor.  The  relation 
has  already  been  altered  many  times,  doubtless ;  once,  we  know, 
within  the  period  covered  by  history,  at  least  in  the  countries 
that  we  call  civilized.  The  relation  was  formerly  a  severely 
simple  one — the  capitalist  owned  the  laborer.  Of  the  difficulty 
and  the  cost  of  abolishing  that  system  it  is  needless  to  speak  at 
length.  Through  centuries  of  time  and  with  an  appalling 
sacrifice  of  life  the  effort  has  gone  on,  a  continuous  war 
characterized  by  monstrous  infractions  of  law  and  morals,  by 
incalculable  cruelty  and  crime.  Our  own  generation  has 
witnessed  the  culminating  triumphs  of  this  revolution,  and  of 
its  three  mightiest  leaders  the  assassination  of  two,  the  death  in 
exile  of  the  third.  And  now,  while  still  the  clank  of  the 
falling  chains  is  echoing  through  the  world,  and  still  a  mighty 
multitude  of  the  world's  workers  is  in  bondage  under  the  old 
system,  the  others,  for  whose  liberation  was  all  this  "expense 
of  spirit  in  a  waste  of  shame,"  are  sharply  challenging  the 

105 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

advantage  of  the  new.  The  new  is,  in  truth,  breaking  down  at 
every  point.  The  relation  of  employer  and  employee  is  giving 
but  little  better  satisfaction  than  that  of  master  and  slave. 
The  difference  between  the  two  is,  indeed,  not  nearly  so  broad 
as  we  persuade  ourselves  to  think  it.  In  many  of  the  industries 
there  is  practically  no  difference  at  all,  and  the  tendency  is 
more  and  more  to  effacement  of  the  difference  where  it  exists. 

Labor  unions,  strikes  and  rioting  are  no  new  remedies  for  this 
insidious  disorder;  they  were  common  in  ancient  Rome  and  still 
more  ancient  Egypt.  In  the  twenty-ninth  year  of  Rameses  III 
a  deputation  of  workmen  employed  in  the  Theban  necropo 
lis  met  the  superintendent  and  the  priests  with  a  statement  of 
their  grievances.  "Behold,"  said  the  spokesman,  "we  are 
brought  to  the  verge  of  famine.  We  have  neither  food,  nor  oil, 
nor  clothing;  we  have  no  fish;  we  have  no  vegetables.  Already 
we  have  sent  up  a  petition  to  our  sovereign  lord  the  Pharaoh, 
praying  that  he  will  give  us  these  things  and  we  are  going  to 
appeal  to  the  Governor  that  we  may  have  the  wherewithal  to 
live."  The  response  to  this  complaint  was  one  day's  rations  of 
corn.  This  appears  to  have  been  enough  only  while  it  lasted, 
for  a  few  weeks  later  the  workmen  were  in  open  revolt.  Thrice 
they  broke  out  of  their  quarter,  rioting  like  mad  and  defying 
the  police.  Whether  they  were  finally  shot  full  of  arrows  by 
the  Pinkerton  men  of  the  period  the  record  does  not  state. 

"Organized  discontent"  in  the  laboring  population  is  no 
new  thing  under  the  sun,  but  in  this  century  and  country  it  has 
a  new  opportunity  and  Omniscience  alone  can  forecast  the  out 
come.  Of  one  thing  we  may  be  very  sure,  and  the  sooner  the 
"capitalist"  can  persuade  himself  to  discern  it  the  sooner  will 
his  eyes  guard  his  neck:  the  relations  between  those  who  are 
able  to  live  without  physical  toil  and  those  who  are  not  are  a 

106 


Industrial  Discontent 


long  way  from  final  adjustment,  but  are  about  to  undergo  a  pro 
found  and  essential  alteration.  That  this  is  to  come  by  peace 
ful  evolution  is  a  hope  which  has  nothing  in  history  to  sustain  it. 
There  are  to  be  bloody  noses  and  cracked  crowns,  and  the 
good  people  who  suffer  themselves  to  be  shocked  by  such  things 
in  others  will  have  a  chance  to  try  them  for  themselves.  The 
working  man  is  not  troubling  himself  greatly  about  a  just  allot 
ment  of  these  blessings ;  so  that  the  greater  part  go  to  those  who 
do  not  work  with  their  hands  he  will  not  consider  too  curiously 
any  person's  claim  to  exemption.  It  would  perhaps  better 
harmonize  with  his  sense  of  the  fitness  of  things  (as  it  would, 
no  doubt,  with  that  of  the  angels)  if  the  advantages  of  the 
transitional  period  fell  mostly  to  the  share  of  such  star-spangled 
impostors  as  Andrew  Carnegie;  but  almost  any  distribution 
that  is  sufficiently  objectionable  as  a  whole  to  the  other  side  will 
be  acceptable  to  the  distributor.  In  the  mean  time  it  is  to  be 
wished  that  the  moralizers  and  homilizers  who  prate  of  "prin 
ciples"  may  have  a  little  damnation  dealt  out  to  them  on 
account.  The  head  that  is  unable  to  entertain  a  philosophical 
view  of  the  situation  would  be  notably  advantaged  by  removal. 

HI. 

It  is  the  immigration  of  "the  oppressed  of  all  nations"  that 
has  made  this  country  one  of  the  worst  on  the  face  of  the 
earth.  The  change  from  good  to  bad  took  place  within  a 
generation — so  quickly  that  few  of  us  have  had  the  nimble- 
ness  of  apprehension  to  "get  it  through  our  heads."  We  go 
on  screaming  our  eagle  in  the  self-same  note  of  triumph  that 
we  were  taught  at  our  fathers'  knees  before  the  eagle  became  a 
buzzard.  America  is  still  "an  asylum  for  the  oppressed;"  and 

107 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

still,  as  always  and  everywhere,  the  oppressed  are  unworthy  of 
asylum,  avenging  upon  those  who  give  them  sanctuary  the 
wrongs  from  which  they  fled.  The  saddest  thing  about  oppres 
sion  is  that  it  makes  its  victims  unfit  for  anything  but  to  be 
oppressed — makes  them  dangerous  alike  to  their  tyrants,  their 
saviors  and  themselves.  In  the  end  they  turn  out  to  be  fairly 
energetic  oppressors.  The  gentleman  in  the  cesspool  invites 
compassion,  certainly,  but  we  may  be  very  well  assured,  before 
undertaking  his  relief  without  a  pole,  that  his  conception  of  a 
prosperous  life  is  merely  to  have  his  nose  above  the  surface 
with  another  gentleman  underfoot. 

All  languages  are  spoken  in  Hell,  but  chiefly  those  of 
Southeastern  Europe.  I  do  not  say  that  a  man  fresh  from  the 
fields  or  the  factories  of  Europe — even  of  Southeastern  Europe 
— may  not  be  a  good  man ;  I  say  only  that,  as  a  matter  of  fact, 
he  commonly  is  not.  In  nine  instances  in  ten  he  is  a  brute 
whom  it  would  be  God's  mercy  to  drown  on  his  arrival,  for  he 
is  constitutionally  unhappy. 

Let  us  not  deny  him  his  grievance:  he  works — when  he 
works — for  men  no  better  than  himself.  He  is  required,  in 
many  instances,  to  take  a  part  of  his  pay  in  "truck"  at  prices 
of  breathless  altitude;  and  the  pay  itself  is  inadequate — 
hardly  more  than  double  what  he  could  get  in  his  own  country. 
Against  all  this  his  howl  is  justified;  but  his  noting  and  assas 
sination  are  not — not  even  when  directed  against  the  property 
and  persons  of  his  employers.  When  directed  against  the 
persons  of  other  laborers,  who  choose  to  exercise  the  funda 
mental  human  right  to  work  for  whom  and  for  what  pay  they 
please — when  he  denies  this  right,  and  with  it  the  right  of 
organized  society  to  exist,  the  necessity  of  shooting  him  is  not 
only  apparent;  it  is  conspicuous  and  imperative.  That  he  and 

108 


Industrial  Discontent 


his  horrible  kind,  of  whatever  nationality,  are  usually  forgiven 
this  just  debt  of  nature,  and  suffered  to  execute,  like  rivers, 
their  annual  spring  rise,  constitutes  the  most  valid  of  the  many 
indictments  that  decent  Americans  by  birth  or  adoption  find 
against  the  feeble  form  of  government  under  which  their 
country  groans.  A  nation  that  will  not  enforce  its  laws  has  no 
claim  to  the  respect  and  allegiance  of  its  people. 

This  "citizen  soldiery"  business  is  a  ghastly  failure.  The 
National  Guard  is  not  worth  the  price  of  its  uniforms.  It  is 
intended  to  be  a  Greater  Constabulary:  its  purpose  is  to  sup 
press  disorders  with  which  the  civil  authorities  are  too  feeble  to 
cope.  How  often  does  it  do  so?  Nine  times  in  ten  it  frater 
nizes  with,  or  is  cowed  or  beaten  by  the  savage  mobs  which  it 
i  is  called  upon  to  kill.  In  a  country  with  a  competent  militia  and 
competent  men  to  use  it  there  would  be  crime  enough  and  some 
to  spare,  but  no  rioting.  Rioting  in  a  Republic  is  without  a 
shadow  of  excuse.  If  we  have  bad  laws,  or  if  our  good  laws 
are  not  enforced;  if  corporations  and  capital  are  "tyrannous 
and  strong;"  if  white  men  murder  one  another  and  black  men 
outrage  white  women,  all  this  is  our  own  fault — the  fault  of 
those,  among  others,  who  seek  redress  or  revenge  by  rioting 
and  lynching.  The  people  have  always  as  good  government,  as 
good  industrial  conditions,  as  effective  protection  of  person, 
property  and  liberty,  as  they  deserve.  They  can  have  what 
ever  they  have  the  honesty  to  desire  and  the  sense  to  set  about 
getting  in  the  right  way.  If  as  citizens  of  a  Republic  we  lack 
the  virtue  and  intelligence  rightly  to  use  the  supreme  power  of 
the  ballot  so  that  it 

"executes  a  freeman's  will 
As  lightning  does  the  will  of  God" 

we  are  unfit  to  be  citizens  of  a  Republic,  undeserving  of  peace, 

109 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

prosperity  and  liberty,  and  have  no  right  to  rise  against  con 
ditions  due  to  our  own  moral  and  intellectual  delinquency. 
There  is  a  simple  way,  Messieurs  the  Masses  to  correct  public 
evils:  put  wise  and  good  men  into  power.  If  you  can  not  do 
that  for  you  are  not  yourselves  wise,  or  will  not  for  you  are  not 
yourselves  good,  you  deserve  to  be  oppressed  when  you  submit 
and  shot  when  you  rise. 

To  shoot  a  rioter  or  lyncher  is  a  high  kind  of  mercy.  Sup 
pose  that  twenty-five  years  ago  (the  longer  ago  the  better)  two 
or  three  criminal  mobs  in  succession  had  been  exterminated  in 
that  way,  "as  the  law  provides."  Suppose  that  several  scores 
of  lives  had  been  so  taken,  including  even  those  of  "innocent 
spectators" — though  that  kind  of  angel  does  not  abound  in  the 
vicinity  of  mobs.  Suppose  that  no  demagogue  judges  had  per 
mitted  officers  in  command  of  the  "firing  lines"  to  be  persecuted 
in  the  courts.  Suppose  that  these  events  had  writ  themselves 
large  and  red  in  the  public  memory.  How  many  lives  would 
this  have  saved?  Just  as  many  as  since  have  been  taken  and  lost 
by  rioters,  plus  those  that  for  a  long  time  to  come  will  be  taken, 
and  minus  those  that  were  taken  at  that  time.  Make  your  own 
computation  from  your  own  data ;  I  insist  only  that  a  rioter  shot 
in  time  saves  nine. 

You  know — you,  the  People — that  all  this  is  true.  You 
know  that  in  a  Republic  lawlessness  is  villainy  entailing  greater 
evils  than  it  cures — that  it  cures  none.  You  know  that  even 
the  "money  power"  is  powerful  only  through  your  own  dis 
honesty  and  cowardice.  You  know  that  nobody  can  bribe  or 
intimidate  a  voter  who  will  not  take  a  bribe  or  suffer  himself 
to  be  intimidated — that  there  can  be  no  "money  power"  in  a 
nation  of  honorable  and  courageous  men.  You  know  that 
"bosses"  and  "machines"  can  not  control  you  if  you  will  not 

110 


Industrial  Discontent 


suffer  then  to  divide  you  into  "parties"  by  playing  upon  your 
credulity  and  senseless  passions.  You  know  all  this,  and  know 
it  all  the  time.  Yet  not  a  man  has  the  courage  to  stand  forth 
and  say  to  your  faces  what  you  know  in  your  hearts.  Well, 
Messieurs  the  Masses,  I  don't  consider  you  dangerous — not 
very.  I  have  not  observed  that  you  want  to  tear  anybody  to 
pieces  for  confessing  your  sins,  even  if  at  the  same  time  he  con 
fesses  his  own.  From  a  considerable  experience  in  that  sort 
of  thing  I  judge  that  you  rather  like  it,  and  that  he  whom, 
secretly,  you  most  despise  is  he  who  echoes  back  to  you  what  he 
is  pleased  to  think  you  think  and  flatters  you  for  gain.  Any 
how,  for  some  reason,  I  never  hear  you  speak  well  of  newspaper 
men  and  politicians,  though  in  the  shadow  of  your  disesteem 
they  get  an  occasional  gleam  of  consolation  by  speaking  fairly 
well  of  one  another. 


Ill 


Crime  and  its 
Correctives 


Crime  and  its  Correctives 


I. 


CIOLOGISTS  have  been  debating  the  theory 
that  the  impulse  to  commit  crime  is  a  disease, 
and  the  ayes  appear  to  have  it — not  the  im 
pulse  but  the  decision.  It  is  gratifying  and  pro 
fitable  to  have  the  point  settled:  we  now  know  "where  we  are 
at,'*  and  can  take  our  course  accordingly.  It  has  for  a  number 
of  years  been  known  to  all  but  a  few  back-number  physicians 
— survivals  from  an  exhausted  regime — that  all  disease  is 
caused  by  bacilli,  which  worm  themselves  into  the  organs  that 
secrete  health  and  enjoin  them  from  the  performance  of  that 
rite.  The  medical  conservatives  mentioned  attempt  to  whittle 
away  the  value  and  significances  of  this  theory  by  affirming  its 
inadequacy  to  account  for  such  disorders  as  broken  heads,  sun 
stroke,  superfluous  toes,  home-sickness,  burns  and  strangulation 
on  the  gallows ;  but  against  the  testimony  of  so  eminent  bacteri 
ologists  as  Drs.  Koch  and  Pasteur  their  carping  is  as  that  of 
the  idle  angler.  The  bacillus  is  not  to  be  denied;  he  has 
brought  his  blankets  and  is  here  to  stay  until  evicted,  and  evic 
tion  can  not  be  wrought  by  talking.  Doubtless  we  may  con 
fidently  expect  his  eventual  suppression  by  a  fresher  and  more 
ingenious  disturber  of  the  physiological  peace,  but  the  bacillus 
is  now  chief  among  ten  thousand  evils  and  it  is  futile  to  attempt 
to  read  him  out  of  the  party. 

It  follows  that  in   order  to  deal   intelligently  with  the 
criminal  impulse  in  our  afflicted  fellow-citizens  we  must  dis- 

115 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

cover  the  bacillus  of  crime.  To  that  end  I  think  that  the  bodies 
of  hanged  assassins  and  such  persons  of  low  degree  as  have  been 
gathered  to  their  fathers  by  the  cares  of  public  office  or  con 
sumed  by  the  rust  of  inactivity  in  prison  should  be  handed 
over  to  the  microscopists  for  examination.  The  bore,  too,  offers 
a  fine  field  for  research,  and  might  justly  enough  be  examined 
alive.  Whether  there  is  one  general — or  as  the  ancient  and 
honorable  orders  prefer  to  say,  "grand" — bacillus,  producing 
a  general  (or  grand)  criminal  impulse  covering  a  multitude 
of  sins,  or  an  infinite  number  of  well  defined  and  several  bacilli, 
each  inciting  to  a  particular  crime,  is  a  question  to  the  determin 
ation  of  which  the  most  distinguished  microscopist  might  be 
proud  to  devote  the  powers  of  his  eye.  If  the  latter  is  the 
case  it  will  somewhat  complicate  the  treatment,  for  clearly  the 
patient  afflicted  with  chronic  robbery  will  require  medicines 
different  from  those  that  might  be  efficacious  in  a  gentleman 
suffering  from  constitutional  theft  or  the  desire  to  represent  his 
District  in  the  Assembly.  But  it  is  permitted  to  us  to  hope 
that  all  crimes,  like  all  arts,  are  essentially  one;  that  murder, 
arson  and  conservatism  are  but  different  symptoms  of  the  same 
physical  disorder,  back  of  which  is  a  microbe  vincible  to  a  single 
medicament,  albeit  the  same  awaits  discovery. 

In  the  fascinating  theory  of  the  unity  of  crime  we  may  not 
unreasonably  hope  to  find  another  evidence  of  the  brotherhood 
of  man,  another  spiritual  bond  tending  to  draw  the  various 
classes  of  society  more  closely  together. 

From  time  to  time  it  is  said  that  a  "wave"  of  some  kind  of 
crime  is  sweeping  the  country.  It  is  all  nonsense  about  "waves" 
of  crime.  Occasionally  occurs  some  crime  notable  for  its 
unusual  features,  or  for  the  renown  of  those  concerned.  It 
arrests  public  attention,  which  for  a  time  is  directed  to  that 

116 


Crime  and  its  Correctives 


particular  kind  of  crime,  and  the  newspapers,  with  business 
like  instinct,  give,  for  a  season,  unusual  prominence  to  the 
record  of  similar  offenses.  Then,  self -deceived,  they  talk  about 
a  "wave,"  or  "epidemic"  of  it.  So  far  is  this  from  the  truth 
that  one  of  the  most  noticeable  characteristics  of  crime  is  the 
steady  and  unbroken  monotony  of  its  occurrence  in  certain 
forms.  There  is  nothing  so  dull  and  unvarying  as  this  tedious 
uniformity  of  repetition.  The  march  of  crime  is  never  re 
tarded,  never  accelerated.  The  criminals  appear  to  be 
thoroughly  well  satisfied  with  their  annual  average,  as  shown 
by  the  periodical  reports  of  their  secretary,  the  statistician. 

A  marked  illustration  occurs  to  me.  Many  years  ago  in 
London  a  well-known  and  respectable  gentleman  was  brutally 
garroted.  It  was  during  the  "silly  season" — between  sessions 
of  Parliament,  when  the  newspapers  are  likely  to  be  dull. 
They  at  once  began  to  report  cases  of  garroting.  There 
appeared  to  be  an  "epidemic  of  garroting."  The  public  mind 
was  terribly  excited,  and  when  Parliament  met  it  hastened  to 
pass  the  infamous  "flogging  act" — a  distinct  reversion  to  the 
senseless  and  discredited  methods  of  physical  torture,  so  allur 
ing  to  the  half  instructed  mind  of  the  average  journalist  of 
today.  Yet  the  statistics  published  by  the  Home  Secretary 
under  whose  administration  the  act  was  passed  show  that 
neither  at  the  time  of  the  alarm  was  there  any  material  increase 
of  garroting,  nor  in  the  period  of  public  tranquillity  succeeding 
was  there  any  appreciable  diminution. 

II. 

By  advocating  painless  removal  of  incurable  idiots  and 
lunatics,  incorrigible  criminals  and  irreclaimable  drunkards 
from  this  vale  of  tears  Dr.  W.  Duncan  McKim  provoked  many 

117 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

a  respectable  but  otherwise  blameless  person  to  throw  a  catfit 
of  great  complexity  and  power.  Yet  Dr.  McKim  seemed  only 
to  anticipate  the  trend  of  public  opinion  and  forecast  its  crystal 
lization  into  law.  It  is  rapidly  becoming  a  question  of  not  what 
we  ought  to  do  with  these  unfortunates,  but  what  we  shall  be 
compelled  to  do.  Study  of  the  statistics  of  the  matter  shows 
that  in  all  civilized  countries  mental  and  moral  diseases  are  in 
creasing,  proportionately  to  population,  at  a  rate  which  in  the 
course  of  a  few  generations  will  make  it  impossible  for  the 
healthy  to  care  for  the  afflicted.  To  do  so  will  require  the 
entire  revenue  which  it  is  possible  to  raise  by  taxation — will 
absorb  all  the  profits  of  all  the  industries  and  professions  and 
make  deeper  and  deeper  inroads  upon  the  capital  from  which 
they  are  derived.  When  it  comes  to  that  there  can  be  but  one 
result.  High  and  humanizing  sentiments  are  angel  visitants, 
whom  we  entertain  with  pride  and  pleasure,  but  when  the 
entertainment  becomes  too  costly  to  be  borne  we  "speed  the 
parting  guest'*  forthwith.  And  it  may  happen  that  in  inviting 
to  his  vacant  place  a  less  exciting  successor — that  in  replacing 
Sentiment  with  Reason — we  shall,  in  this  instance,  learn  to  our 
joy  that  we  do  but  entertain  another  angel.  For  nothing  is  so 
heavenly  as  Reason ;  nothing  is  so  sweet  and  compassionate  as 
her  voice — 

"Not  harsh  and  crabbed,  as  dull  fools  suppose, 
But  musical  as  is  Apollo's  lute." 

Is  it  cruel,  is  it  heartless,  is  it  barbarous  to  use  something  of 
the  same  care  in  breeding  men  and  women  as  in  breeding  horses 
and  dogs?  Here  is  a  determining  question :  Knowing  yourself 
doomed  to  hopeless  idiocy,  lunacy,  crime  or  drunkenness,  would 
you,  or  would  you  not,  welcome  a  painless  death?  Let  us 

118 


Crime  and  its  Correctives 


assume  that  you  would.   Upon  what  ground,  then,  would  you 
deny  to  another  a  boon  that  you  would  desire  for  yourself? 

III. 

The  good  American  is,  as  a  rule,  pretty  hard  upon  roguery, 
but  he  atones  for  his  austerity  by  an  amiable  toleration  of 
rogues.  His  only  requirement  is  that  he  must  personally  know 
the  rogues.  We  all  "denounce"  thieves  loudly  enough,  if  we 
have  not  the  honor  of  their  acquaintance.  If  we  have,  why, 
that  is  different — unless  they  have  the  actual  odor  of  the 
prison  about  them.  We  may  know  them  guilty,  but  we  meet 
them,  shake  hands  with  them,  drink  with  them,  and  if  they 
happen  to  be  wealthy  or  otherwise  great  invite  them  to  our 
houses,  and  deem  it  an  honor  to  frequent  theirs.  We  do  not 
"approve  their  methods" — let  that  be  understood;  and  thereby 
they  are  sufficiently  punished.  The  notion  that  a  knave  cares  a 
pin  what  is  thought  of  his  ways  by  one  who  is  civil  and 
friendly  to  himself  appears  to  have  been  invented  by  a  humorist. 
On  the  vaudeville  stage  of  Mars  it  would  probably  have  made 
his  fortune.  If  warrants  of  arrest  were  out  for  every  man  in  this 
country  who  is  conscious  of  having  repeatedly  shaken  hands 
with  persons  whom  he  knew  to  be  knaves  there  would  be  no 
guiltless  person  to  serve  them. 

I  know  men  standing  high  in  journalism  who  today  will 
"expose"  and  bitterly  "denounce"  a  certain  rascality  and  to 
morrow  will  be  hobnobbing  with  the  rascals  whom  they  have 
named.  I  know  legislators  of  renown  who  habitually  in  "the 
halls  of  legislation"  raise  their  voices  against  the  dishonest 
schemes  of  some  "trust  magnate,"  and  are  habitually  seen  in 
familiar  conversation  with  him.  Indubitably  these  be  hypo 
crites  all.  Between  the  head  and  the  heart  of  such  a  man  is  a 

119 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

wall  of  adamant,  and  neither  organ  knows  what  the  other  is 
doing. 

If  social  recognition  were  denied  to  rogues  they  would  be 
fewer  by  many.  Some  would  only  the  more  diligently  cover 
their  tracks  along  the  devious  paths  of  unrighteousness,  but 
others  would  do  so  much  violence  to  their  consciences  as  to 
renounce  the  disadvantages  of  rascality  for  those  of  an  honest 
life.  An  unworthy  person  dreads  nothing  so  much  as  the  with 
holding  of  an  honest  hand,  the  slow  inevitable  stroke  of  an 
ignoring  eye. 

For  one  having  knowledge  of  Mr.  John  D.  Rockefeller's 
social  life  and  connections  it  would  be  easy  to  name  a  dozen 
men  and  women  who  by  a  conspiracy  of  conscription  could 
profoundly  affect  the  plans  and  profits  of  the  Standard  Oil 
Company.  I  have  been  asked:  "If  John  D.  Rockefeller  were 
introduced  to  you  by  a  friend,  would  you  refuse  to  take  his 
hand?'*  I  certainly  should — and  if  ever  thereafter  I  took  the 
hand  of  that  hardy  "friend"  it  would  be  after  his  repentance 
and  promise  to  reform  his  ways.  We  have  Rockefellers  and 
Morgans  because  we  have  "respectable"  persons  who  are  not 
ashamed  to  take  them  by  the  hand,  to  be  seen  with  them,  to  say 
that  they  know  them.  In  such  it  is  treachery  to  censure  them; 
to  cry  out  when  robbed  by  them  is  to  turn  State's  evidence. 

One  may  smile  upon  a  rascal  (most  of  us  do  so  many  times 
a  day)  if  one  does  not  know  him  to  be  a  rascal,  and  has  not 
said  he  is ;  but  knowing  him  to  be,  or  having  said  he  is,  to  smile 
upon  him  is  to  be  a  hypocrite — just  a  plain  hypocrite  or  a 
sycophantic  hypocrite,  according  to  the  station  in  life  of  the 
rascal  smiled  upon.  There  are  more  plain  hypocrites  than 
sycophantic  ones,  for  there  are  more  rascals  of  no  consequence 
than  rich  and  distinguished  ones,  though  they  get  fewer  smiles 

120 


Crime  and  its  Correctives 


each.  The  American  people  will  be  plundered  as  long  as  the 
American  character  is  what  it  is;  as  long  as  it  is  tolerant  of 
successful  knavery;  as  long  as  American  ingenuity  draws  an 
imaginary  distinction  between  a  man's  public  character  and  his 
private — his  commercial  and  his  personal.  In  brief,  the 
American  people  will  be  plundered  as  long  as  they  deserve 
to  be  plundered.  No  human  law  can  stop  it,  none  ought  to 
stop  it,  for  that  would  abrogate  a  higher  and  more  salutary 
law:  "As  ye  sow  ye  shall  reap." 

In  a  sermon  by  the  Rev.  Dr.  Parkhurst  is  the  following: 
"The  story  of  all  our  Lord's  dealings  with  sinners  leaves 
upon  the  mind  the  invariable  impression,  if  only  the  story  be 
read  sympathetically  and  earnestly,  that  He  always  felt  kindly 
towards  the  transgressor,  but  could  have  no  tenderness  of 
regard  toward  the  transgression.  There  is  no  safe  and  success 
ful  dealing  with  sin  of  any  kind  save  as  that  distinction  is 
appreciated  and  made  a  continual  factor  in  our  feelings  and 
efforts." 

With  all  due  respect  for  Dr.  Parkhurst,  that  is  nonsense. 
If  he  will  read  his  New  Testament  more  understandingly  he 
will  observe  that  Christ's  kindly  feeling  to  transgressors  was  not 
to  be  counted  on  by  sinners  of  every  kind,  and  it  was  not  always 
in  evidence ;  for  example,  when  he  flogged  the  money-changers 
out  of  the  temple.  Nor  is  Dr.  Parkhurst  himself  any  too 
amiably  disposed  toward  the  children  of  darkness.  It  is  not 
by  mild  words  and  gentle  means  that  he  has  hurled  the  mighty 
from  their  seats  and  exalted  them  of  low  degree.  Such 
revolutions  as  he  set  afoot  are  not  made  with  spiritual  rose- 
water  ;  there  must  be  the  contagion  of  a  noble  indignation  fueled 
with  harder  wood  than  abstractions.  The  people  can  not  be 
collected  and  incited  to  take  sides  by  the  spectacle  of  a 

121 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

man  fighting  something  that  does  not  fight  back.  It  is  men  that 
Dr.  Parkhurst  is  trouncing — not  their  crimes — not  Crime.  He 
may  fancy  himself  "dowered  with  the  hate  of  hate,  the  scorn 
of  scorn,"  but  in  reality  he  does  not  hate  hate  but  hates  the 
hateful,  and  scorns,  not  scorn,  but  the  scornworthy. 

It  is  singular  with  what  tenacity  that  amusing  though 
mischievous  superstition  keeps  its  hold  upon  the  human  mind — 
that  grave  bona  fide  personification  of  abstractions  and  the 
funny  delusion  that  it  is  possible  to  hate  or  love  them.  Sin 
is  not  a  thing;  there  is  no  existing  object  corresponding  to  any 
of  the  mere  counter-words  that  are  properly  named  abstract 
nouns.  One  can  no  more  hate  sin  or  love  virtue  than  one  can 
hate  a  vacuum  (which  Nature — itself  imaginary — was  once 
by  the  scientists  of  the  period  solemnly  held  to  do)  or  love  one 
of  the  three  dimensions.  We  may  think  that  while  loving  a 
sinner  we  hate  the  sin,  but  that  is  not  so ;  if  anything  is  hated  it 
is  other  sinners  of  the  same  kind,  who  are  not  quite  so  close  to 
us. 

"But,"  says  Citizen  Goodheart,  who  thinks  with  difficulty, 
"shall  I  throw  over  my  friend  when  he  is  in  trouble?"  Yes, 
when  you  are  convinced  that  he  deserves  to  be  in  trouble ;  throw 
him  all  the  harder  and  the  further  because  he  is  your  friend. 
In  addition  to  his  particular  offense  against  society  he  has  dis 
graced  you.  If  there  are  to  be  lenity  and  charity  let  them  go 
to  the  criminal  who  has  foreborne  to  involve  you  in  his  shame. 
It  were  a  pretty  state  of  affairs  if  an  undetected  scamp,  fearing 
exposure,  could  make  you  a  co-defendant  by  so  easy  a  precau 
tion  as  securing  your  acquaintance  and  regard.  Don't  throw 
the  first  stone,  of  course,  but  when  convinced  that  your  friend 
is  a  proper  target,  heave  away  with  a  right  hearty  good-will, 

122 


Crime  and  its  Correctives 


and  let  the  stone  be  of  serviceable  dimensions,  scabrous, 
textured  flintwise  and  delivered  with  a  good  aim. 

The  French  have  a  saying  to  the  effect  that  to  know  all  is 
to  pardon  all ;  and  doubtless  with  an  omniscient  insight  into  the 
causes  of  character  we  should  find  the  field  of  moral  respon 
sibility  pretty  thickly  strewn  with  extenuating  circumstances 
very  suitable  indeed  for  consideration  by  a  god  who  has  had  a 
hand  in  besetting  "with  pitfall  and  with  gin"  the  road  we  are  to 
.wander  in.  But  I  submit  that  universal  forgiveness  would 
hardly  do  as  a  working  principle.  Even  those  who  are  most 
apt  and  facile  with  the  incident  of  the  woman  taken  in  adultery 
commonly  cherish  a  secret  respect  for  the  doctrine  of  eternal 
damnation;  and  some  of  them  are  known  to  pin  their  faith  to  the 
penal  code  of  their  state.  Moreover  there  is  some  reason  to 
believe  that  the  sinning  woman,  being  "taken,"  was  penitent — 
they  usually  are  when  found  out. 

I  care  nothing  about  principles — they  are  lumber  and 
rubbish.  What  concerns  our  happiness  and  welfare,  as  affect- 
ible  by  our  fellowmen,  is  conduct.  "Principles,  not  men,"  is  a 
rogue's  cry;  rascality's  counsel  to  stupidity,  the  noise  of  the 
duper  duping  on  his  dupe.  He  shouts  it  most  loudly  and  with 
the  keenest  sense  of  its  advantage  who  most  desires  inattention 
to  his  own  conduct,  or  to  that  forecast  of  it,  his  character.  As 
to  sin,  that  has  an  abundance  of  expounders  and  is  already 
universally  known  to  be  wicked.  What  more  can  be  said 
^against  it,  and  why  go  on  repeating  that?  The  thing  is  a  trifle 
wordworn,  whereas  the  sinner  cometh  up  as  a  flower  every  day, 
fresh,  ingenious  and  inviting.  Sin  is  not  at  all  dangerous  to 
society;  it  is  the  sinner  that  does  all  the  mischief.  Sin  has  no 
•arms  to  thrust  into  the  public  treasury  and  the  private;  no 
hands  with  which  to  cut  a  throat;  no  tongue  to  wreck  a  reputa- 

123 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

tion  withal.  I  would  no  more  attack  it  than  I  would  attack  an 
isosceles  triangle,  a  vacuum,  or  Hume's  "phantasm  floating  in 
a  void."  My  chosen  enemy  must  be  something  that  has  a  skin 
for  my  switch,  a  head  for  my  cudgel — something  that  can 
smart  and  ache  and,  if  so  minded,  fight  back.  I  have  no 
quarrel  with  abstractions;  so  far  as  I  know  they  are  all  good 
citizens. 


124 


The  Death 
Penalty 


The  Death  Penalty 


I. 

OWN  with  the  gallows!"  is  a  cry  not  un 
familiar  in  America.  There  is  always  a  move 
ment  afoot  to  make  odious  the  just  principle 
of  "a  life  for  a  life" — to  represent  it  as  "a 
relic  of  barbarism,"  "a  usurpation  of  the  divine  authority," 
and  the  rotten  rest  of  it.  The  law  making  murder  punishable  by 
death  is  as  purely  a  measure  of  self-defense  as  is  the  display  of 
a  pistol  to  one  diligently  endeavoring  to  kill  without  provoca 
tion.  Even  the  most  brainless  opponent  of  "capital  punish 
ment"  would  do  that  if  he  knew  enough.  It  is  in  precisely  the 
same  sense  an  admonition,  a  warning  to  abstain  from  crime. 
Society  says  by  that  law:  "If  you  kill  one  of  us  you  die,"  just  as 
by  display  of  the  pistol  the  individual  whose  life  is  attacked 
says:  "Desist  or  be  shot."  To  be  effective  the  warning  in  either 
case  must  be  more  than  an  idle  threat.  Even  the  most  unearthly 
reasoner  among  the  gallows-downing  unfortunates  would 
hardly  expect  to  frighten  away  an  assassin  who  knew  the  pistol 
to  be  unloaded.  Of  course  these  queer  illogicians  can  not  be 
made  to  understand  that  their  position  commits  them  to  absolute 
non-resistance  to  any  kind  of  aggression,  and  that  is  fortunate 
for  the  rest  of  us,  for  if  as  Christians  they  frankly  and  con 
sistently  took  that  ground  we  should  be  under  the  miserable 
necessity  of  respecting  them. 

We  have  good  reason  to  hold  that  the  horrible  prevalence 

127 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

of  murder  in  this  country  is  due  to  the  fact  that  we  do  not 
execute  our  laws — that  the  death  penalty  is  threatened  but  not 
inflicted — that  the  pistol  is  not  loaded.  In  civilized  countries, 
where  there  is  enough  respect  for  the  laws  to  administer  them, 
there  is  enough  to  obey  them.  While  man  still  has  as  much  of 
the  ancestral  brute  as  his  skin  can  hold  without  cracking  we 
shall  have  thieves  and  demagogues  and  anarchists  and  assassins 
and  persons  with  a  private  system  of  lexicography  who  define 
hanging  as  murder  and  murder  as  mischance,  and  many 
another  disagreeable  creation,  but  in  all  this  welter  of  crime  and 
stupidity  are  areas  where  human  life  is  comparatively  secure 
against  the  human  hand.  It  is  at  least  a  significant  coincidence 
that  in  these  the  death  penalty  for  murder  is  fairly  well  enforced 
by  judges  who  do  not  derive  any  part  of  their  authority  from 
those  for  whose  restraint  and  punishment  they  hold  it.  Against 
the  life  of  one  guiltless  person  the  lives  of  ten  thousand  murderers 
count  for  nothing;  their  hanging  is  a  public  good,  without 
reference  to  the  crimes  that  disclose  their  deserts.  If  we  could 
discover  them  by  other  signs  than  their  bloody  deeds  they 
should  be  hanged  anyhow.  Unfortunately  we  must  have  a 
death  as  evidence.  The  scientists  who  will  tell  us  how  to  recog 
nize  the  potential  assassin,  and  persuade  us  to  kill  him,  will 
be  the  greatest  benefactor  of  his  century. 

What  would  these  enemies  of  the  gibbet  have? — these 
lineal  descendants  of  the  drunken  mobs  that  pelted  the  hangmen 
at  Tyburn  Tree;  this  progeny  of  criminals,  which  has  so  de 
filed  with  the  mud  of  its  animosity  the  noble  office  of  public 
executioner  that  even  "in  this  enlightened  age"  he  shirks  his 
high  duty,  entrusting  it  to  a  hidden  or  unnamed  subordinate? 
If  murder  is  unjust  of  what  importance  is  it  whether  it's 
punishment  by  death  be  just  or  not? — nobody  needs  to  incur  it. 

128 


The  Death  Penalty 


Men  are  not  drafted  for  the  death  penalty;  they  volunteer. 
"Then  it  is  not  deterrent,'*  mutters  the  gentleman  whose  rude 
forefather  pelted  the  hangman.  Well,  as  to  that,  the  law 
which  is  to  accomplish  more  than  a  part  of  its  purpose  must  be 
awaited  with  great  patience.  Every  murder  proves  that  hang 
ing  is  not  altogether  deterrent;  every  hanging  that  it  is  some 
what  deterrent — it  deters  the  person  hanged.  A  man's  first 
murder  is  his  crime,  his  second  is  ours. 

The  voice  of  Theosophy  has  been  heard  in  favor  of  down 
ing  the  gallows.  As  usual  the  voice  is  a  trifle  vague  and  it 
babbles.  Clear  speech  is  the  outcome  of  clear  thought,  and 
that  is  something  to  which  Theosophists  are  not  addicted.  Con 
sidering  their  infirmity  in  that  way,  it  would  be  hardly  fair  to 
take  them  as  seriously  as  they  take  themselves,  but  when  any 
considerable  number  of  apparently  earnest  citizens  unite  in  a 
petition  to  the  Governor  of  their  State,  to  commute  the  death 
sentence  of  a  convicted  assassin  without  alleging  a  doubt  of  his 
guilt  the  phenomenon  challenges  a  certain  attention  to  what  they 
do  allege.  What  these  amiable  persons  hold,  it  seems,  is  what  was 
held  by  Alphonse  Karr :  the  expediency  of  abolishing  the  death 
penalty;  but  apparently  they  do  not  hold,  with  him,  that  the 
assassins  should  begin.  They  want  the  State  to  begin,  believing 
that  the  magnanimous  example  will  effect  a  change  of  heart  in 
those  about  to  murder.  This,  I  take  it,  is  the  meaning  of  their 
assertion  that  "death  penalties  have  not  the  deterring  influence 
which  imprisonment  for  life  carries."  In  this  they  obviously 
err:  death  deters  at  least  the  person  who  suffers  it — he  commits 
no  more  murder;  whereas  the  assassin  who  is  imprisoned  for 
life  and  immune  from  further  punishment  may  with  impunity 
kill  his  keeper  or  whomsoever  he  may  be  able  to  get  at.  Even  as 
matters  now  are,  the  most  incessant  vigilance  is  required  to  pre- 
129 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

vent  convicts  in  prison  from  murdering  their  attendants  and  one 
another.  How  would  it  be  if  the  "life-termer"  were  assured 
against  any  additional  inconvenience  for  braining  a  guard 
occasionally,  or  strangling  a  chaplain  now  and  then?  A 
penitentiary  may  be  described  as  a  place  of  punishment  and 
reward;  and  under  the  system  proposed  the  difference  in  de 
sirableness  between  a  sentence  and  an  appointment  would  be 
virtually  effaced.  To  overcome  this  objection  a  life  sentence 
would  have  to  mean  solitary  confinement,  and  that  means  in 
sanity.  Is  that  what  these  Theosophical  gentlemen  propose  to 
substitute  for  death? 

These  petitioners  call  the  death  penalty  "a  relic  of  bar 
barism,"  which  is  neither  conclusive  nor  true.  What  is  required 
is  not  loose  assertion  and  dogs-eared  phrases,  but  evidence 
of  futility,  or,  in  lack  of  that,  cogent  reasoning.  It  is  true  that 
the  most  barbarous  nations  inflict  the  death  penalty  most 
frequently  and  for  the  greatest  number  of  offenses,  but  that  is 
because  barbarians  are  more  criminal  in  instinct  and  less  easily 
controlled  by  gentle  methods  than  civilized  peoples.  That  is 
why  we  call  them  barbarous.  It  is  not  so  very  long  since  our 
English  ancestors  punished  more  than  forty  kinds  of  crime  with 
death.  The  fact  that  the  hangman,  the  boiler-in-oil  and  the 
breaker-on-the-wheel  had  their  hands  full  does  not  show  that  the 
laws  were  futile ;  it  shows  that  the  dear  old  boys  from  whom  we 
are  proud  to  derive  ourselves  were  a  bad  lot — of  which  we 
have  abundant  corroborative  evidence  in  their  brutal  pastimes 
and  in  their  manners  and  customs  generally.  To  have  restrained 
that  crowd  by  the  rose-water  methods  of  modern  penology — 
that  is  unthinkable. 

The  death  penalty,  say  the  memorialists,  "creates  blood- 
thirstiness  in  the  unthinking  masses  and  defeats  its  own  ends.  It 

130 


The  Death  Penalty 


is  a  cause  of  murder,  not  a  check."  These  gentlemen  are  them 
selves  of  "the  unthinking  masses" — they  do  not  know  how  to 
think.  Let  them  try  to  trace  and  lucidly  expound  the  chain  of 
motives  lying  between  the  knowledge  that  a  murderer  has  been 
hanged  and  the  wish  to  commit  a  murder.  How,  precisely,  does 
the  one  beget  the  other?  By  what  unearthly  process  of  reason 
ing  does  a  man  turning  away  from  the  gallows  persuade  him 
self  that  it  is  expedient  to  incur  the  danger  of  hanging?  Let 
us  have  pointed  out  to  us  the  several  steps  in  that  remarkable 
mental  progress.  Obviously,  the  thing  is  absurd;  one  might  as 
reasonably  say  that  contemplation  of  a  pitted  face  will  make  a 
man  go  and  catch  smallpox,  or  the  spectacle  of  an  amputated 
limb  on  the  scrap-heap  of  a  hospital  tempt  him  to  cut  off  his 
arm. 

"An  eye  for  an  eye  and  a  tooth  for  a  tooth,"  says  the 
Theosophist,  "is  not  justice.  It  is  revenge  and  unworthy  of  a 
Christian  civilization."  It  is  exact  justice:  nobody  can  think 
of  anything  more  accurately  just  than  such  punishments  would 
be,  whatever  the  motive  in  awarding  them.  Unfortunately  such 
a  system  is  not  practicable,  but  he  who  denies  its  absolute 
justice  must  deny  also  the  justice  of  a  bushel  of  corn  for  a  bushel 
of  corn,  a  dollar  for  a  dollar,  service  for  service.  We  can  not 
undertake  by  such  clumsy  means  as  laws  and  courts  to  do  to 
the  criminal  exactly  what  he  has  done  to  his  victim,  but  to 
demand  a  life  for  a  life  is  simple,  practicable,  expedient  and 
(therefore)  right. 

Here  are  two  of  these  gentlemen's  dicta,  between  which 
they  inserted  the  one  just  considered,  though  properly  they 
should  go  together  in  frank  inconsistency : 

"6.     It    [the  death  penalty]    punishes  the  innocent  a 
thousand  times  more  than  the  guilty.     Death  is  merciful  to 

131 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

the  tortures  which  the  living  relatives  must  undergo.    And  they 
have  committed  no  crime." 

"8.  Death  penalties  have  not  the  deterring  influence 
which  imprisonment  for  life  carries.  Mere  death  is  not  dreaded. 
See  the  number  of  suicides.  Hopeless  captivity  is  much  more 


severe." 


Merely  noting  that  the  "living  relatives"  whose  sorrows 
so  sympathetically  affect  these  soft-hearted  and  soft-headed 
persons  are  those  of  the  murderer,  not  those  of  his  victim,  let 
us  consider  what  they  really  say,  not  what  they  think  they  say : 
"Death  is  no  very  great  punishment,  for  the  criminal  doesn't 
mind  it  much,  but  hopeless  captivity  is  a  very  great  punishment 
indeed.  Therefore,  let  us  spare  the  assassin's  family  the  tortures 
they  will  suffer  if  we  inflict  the  lighter  penalty.  Let  us  make 
it  easier  for  them  by  inflicting  the  severer  one." 

There  is  sense  for  you! — sense  of  the  sound  old  fruity 
Theosophical  sort — the  kind  of  sense  that  has  lifted  "The 
Beautiful  Cult"  out  of  the  dark  domain  of  reason  into  the 
serene  altitudes  of  inexpressible  Thrill! 

As  to  "hopeless  captivity,"  though,  there  is  no  such  thing. 
In  legislation,  today  can  not  bind  tomorrow.  By  an  act  of 
the  Legislature — even  by  a  constitutional  prohibition,  we  may 
do  away  with  the  pardoning  power ;  but  laws  can  be  repealed, 
constitutions  amended. 

The  public  has  a  short  memory,  signatures  to  petitions  in 
the  line  of  mercy  are  had  for  the  asking,  and  tender-hearted 
Governors  are  familiar  afflictions.  We  have  life  sentences 
already,  and  sometimes  they  are  served  to  the  end — if  the 
end  comes  soon  enough!  but  the  average  length  of  "life  im 
prisonment"  is,  I  am  told,  a  little  more  than  seven  years.  Hope 
springs  eternal  in  the  human  beast,  and  matters  simply  can  not 

132 


The  Death  Penalty 


be  so  arranged  that  in  entering  the  penitentiary  he  will  "leave 
hope  behind."  Hopeless  captivity  is  a  dream. 

I  quote  again: 

"9.  Life  imprisonment  is  the  natural  and  humane  check 
upon  one  who  has  proven  his  unfitness  for  freedom  by  taking 
life  deliberately." 

What!  it  is  no  longer  "much  more  severe"  than  the  "relic 
of  barbarism  ?"  In  the  course  of  a  half  dozen  lines  of  petition  it 
has  become  "humane"?  Truly  these  are  lightning  changes  of 
character!  It  would  be  pleasing  to  know  just  what  these 
worthy  Theosophers  have  the  happiness  to  think  that  they 
think. 

"It  is  the  only  punishment  that  receives  the  consent  of 


conscience." 


That  is  to  say,  their  conscience  and  that  of  the  convicted 
assassin. 

"Taking  the  life  of  a  murderer  does  not  restore  the  life  he 
took  therefore,  it  is  a  most  illogical  punishment.  Two  wrongs 
do  not  make  a  right." 

Here's  richness!  Hanging  an  assassin  is  illogical  because 
it  does  not  restore  the  life  of  his  victim;  incarceration  does; 
therefore,  incarceration  is  logical — quod  erat  demonstrandum. 

Two  wrongs  certainly  do  not  make  a  right,  but  the  verit 
able  thing  in  dispute  is  whether  taking  the  life  of  a  life-taker 
is  a  wrong.  So  naked  and  unashamed  an  example  of  petitio 
principii  would  disgrace  a  debater  in  a  pinafore.  And  these 
wonder-mongers  have  the  incredible  effrontery  to  babble  of 
"logic"!  Why,  if  one  of  them  were  to  meet  a  syllogism  in  a 
lonely  road  he  would  run  away  in  a  hundred  and  fifty  direc 
tions  as  hard  as  ever  he  could  hook  it.  One  is  almost  ashamed 
to  dispute  with  such  intellectual  cloutlings. 

133 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

Whatever  an  individual  may  rightly  do  to  protect  himself 
society  may  rightly  do  to  protect  him,  for  he  is  a  part  of  itself. 
If  he  may  rightly  take  life  in  defending  himself  society  may 
rightly  take  life  in  defending  him.  If  society  may  rightly  take 
life  in  defending  him  it  may  rightly  threaten  to  take  it.  Having 
rightly  and  mercifully  threatened  to  take  it,  it  not  only  rightly 
may  take  it,  but  expediently  must. 

The  law  of  a  life  for  a  life  does  not  altogether  prevent 
murder.  No  law  can  altogether  prevent  any  form  of  crime,  nor 
is  it  desirable  that  it  should.  Doubtless  God  could  so  have 
created  us  that  our  sense  of  right  and  justice  could  have  existed 
without  contemplation  of  injustice  and  wrong,  as  doubtless  he 
could  so  have  created  us  that  we  could  have  felt  compassion 
without  a  knowledge  of  suffering,  but  doubtless  he  did  not.  Con 
stituted  as  we  are,  we  can  know  good  only  by  contrast  with  evil. 
Our  sense  of  sin  is  what  our  virtues  feed  upon ;  in  the  thin  air  of 
universal  morality  the  altar-fires  of  honor  and  the  beacons  of 
conscience  could  not  be  kept  alight.  A  community  without 
crime  would  be  a  community  without  warm  and  elevated  senti 
ments — without  the  sense  of  justice,  without  generosity,  without 
courage,  without  magnanimity — a  community  of  small,  smug 
souls,  uninteresting  to  God  and  uncoveted  by  the  Devil.  We 
can  have  too  much  of  crime,  no  doubt ;  what  the  wholesome  pro 
portion  is  none  can  say.  Just  now  we  are  running  a  good  deal 
to  murder,  but  he  who  can  gravely  attribute  that  phenomenon, 
or  any  part  of  it,  to  infliction  of  the  death  penalty,  instead  of 
virtual  immunity  from  any  penalty  at  all,  is  justly  entitled  to 
the  innocent  satisfaction  that  comes  of  being  a  simpleton. 

The  New  Woman  is  against  the  death  penalty,  naturally, 
for  she  is  hot  and  hardy  in  the  conviction  that  whatever  is  is 
wrong.  She  has  visited  this  world  in  order  to  straighten  things 

134 


The  Death  Penalty 


about  a  bit,  and  is  in  distress  lest  the  number  of  things  be 
insufficient  to  her  need.  The  matter  is  important  variously;  not 
least  so  in  its  relation  to  the  new  heaven  and  the  new  earth 
that  are  to  be  the  outcome  of  woman  suffrage.  There  can  be  no 
doubt  that  the  vast  majority  of  women  have  sentimental  objec 
tions  to  the  death  penalty  that  quite  outweigh  such  practical 
considerations  in  its  favor  as  they  can  be  persuaded  to  compre 
hend.  Aided  by  the  minority  of  men  afflicted  by  the  same  men 
tal  malady,  they  will  indubitably  effect  its  abolition  in  the  first 
lustrum  of  their  political  activity.  The  New  Woman  will 
scarcely  feel  the  seat  of  power  warm  beneath  her  before  giving 
to  the  assassin's  "unhand  me  villain!"  the  authority  of  law.  So 
we  shall  make  again  the  old  experiment,  discredited  by  a 
thousand  failures,  of  preventing  crime  by  tenderness  to  caught 
criminals.  And  the  criminal  uncaught  will  treat  us  to  a  quality 
of  toughness  notably  augmented  by  the  Christian  spirit  of  the 
regime. 

II. 

As  to  painless  executions,  the  simple  and  practical  way  to 
make  them  both  just  and  popular  is  the  adoption  by  murderers 
of  a  system  of  painless  assassinations.  Until  this  is  done  there 
seems  to  be  no  hope  that  the  people  will  renounce  the  whole 
some  discomfort  of  the  style  of  executions  endeared  to  them  by 
memories  and  associations  of  the  tenderest  character.  There 
is  also,  I  fancy,  a  shaping  notion  in  the  public  mind  that 
the  penologists  and  their  allies  have  gone  about  as  far  as  they 
can  safely  be  permitted  to  go  in  the  direction  of  a  softer  suasion 
of  the  criminal  nature  toward  good  behavior.  The  modern 
prison  has  become  a  rather  more  comfortable  habitation  than  the 
dangerous  classes  are  accustomed  to  at  home.  Modern  prison 

135 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

life  has  in  their  eyes  something  of  the  charm  and  glamor  of  an 
ideal  existence,  like  that  in  the  Happy  Valley  from  which 
Rasselas  had  the  folly  to  escape.  Whatever  advantages  to 
the  public  may  be  secured  by  abating  the  rigors  of  imprisonment 
and  inconveniences  incident  to  execution,  there  is  this  objection, 
it  makes  them  less  deterrent.  Let  the  penologers  and  philan- 
thropers  have  their  way  and  even  hanging  might  be  made  so 
pleasant  and  withal  so  interesting  a  social  distinction  that  it 
would  deter  nobody  but  the  person  hanged.  Adopt  the  eutha 
nasian  method  of  electricity,  asphyxia  by  smothering  in  rose- 
leaves,  or  slow  poisoning  with  rich  food,  and  the  death  penalty 
may  come  to  be  regarded  as  the  object  of  a  noble  ambition  to 
the  bon  vivant,  and  the  rising  young  suicide  may  go  and  murder 
somebody  else  instead  of  himself  in  order  to  receive  a  happier 
dispatch  than  his  own  'prentice  hand  can  assure  him. 

But  the  advocates  of  agreeable  pains  and  penalties  tell  us 
that  in  the  darker  ages,  when  cruel  and  degrading  punish 
ment  was  the  rule,  and  was  freely  inflicted  for  every  light  in 
fraction  of  the  law,  crime  was  more  common  than  it  is  now; 
and  in  this  they  appear  to  be  right.  But  they  one  and  all  over 
look  a  fact  equally  obvious  and  vastly  significant:  that  the  in 
tellectual,  moral  and  social  condition  of  the  masses  was  very 
low.  Crime  was  more  common  because  ignorance  was  more 
common,  poverty  was  more  common,  sins  of  authority,  and 
therefore  hatred  of  authority,  were  more  common.  The  world 
of  even  a  century  ago  was  a  quite  different  world  from  the 
world  of  today,  and  a  vastly  more  uncomfortable  one.  The 
popular  adage  to  the  contrary  notwithstanding,  human  nature 
was  not  by  a  long  cut  the  same  then  that  it  is  now.  In  the 
very  ancient  time  of  that  early  English  king,  George  HI,  when 
women  were  burned  at  the  stake  in  public  for  various  offenses 

136 


The  Death  Penalty 


and  men  were  hanged  for  "coining"  and  children  for  theft,  and 
in  the  still  remoter  period,  (czrca  1530)  when  poisoners  were 
boiled  in  several  waters,  divers  sorts  of  criminals  were  disem 
boweled  and  some  are  thought  to  have  undergone  the  peine  forte 
et  dure  of  cold-pressing  (an  infliction  which  the  pen  of  Hugo 
has  since  made  popular — in  literature) — in  these  wicked  old 
days  it  is  possible  that  crime  flourished,  not  because  of  the  law's 
severity,  but  in  spite  of  it.  It  is  possible  that  our  respected  and 
respectable  ancestors  understood  the  situation  as  it  then  was  a 
trifle  better  than  we  can  understand  it  on  the  hither  side  of  this 
gulf  of  years,  and  that  they  were  not  the  reasonless  barbarians 
that  we  think  them  to  have  been.  And  if  they  were,  what 
must  have  been  the  unreason  and  barbarity  of  the  criminal 
element  with  which  they  had  to  deal? 

I  am  far  from  thinking  that  severity  of  punishment  can  have 
the  same  restraining  effect  as  probability  of  some  punishment 
being  inflicted ;  but  if  mildness  of  penalty  is  to  be  superadded  to 
difficulty  of  conviction,  and  both  are  to  be  mounted  upon  laxity 
in  detection,  the  "pile"  will  be  "complete"  with  a  vengeance. 
There  is  a  peculiar  fitness,  perhaps,  in  the  fact  that  all  these 
pleas  for  comfortable  punishment  should  be  urged  at  a  time 
when  there  appears  to  be  a  tolerably  general  disposition  to  in 
flict  no  punishment  at  all.  There  are,  however,  still  a  few  old- 
fashioned  persons  who  hold  it  obvious  that  one  who  is  ambitious 
to  break  the  laws  of  his  country  will  not  with  as  light  a  heart 
and  as  airy  an  indifference  incur  the  peril  of  a  harsh  penalty 
as  he  will  the  chance  of  one  more  nearly  resembling  that  which 
he  would  select  for  himself. 


137 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 


in. 

After  lying  for  more  than  a  century  dead  I  was  revived, 
given  a  new  body,  and  restored  to  society.  This  was  in  the  year 
2015.  The  first  thing  of  interest  that  I  observed  was  an  enor 
mous  building,  covering  a  square  mile  of  ground.  It  was  sur 
rounded  on  all  sides  by  a  high,  strong  wall  of  hewn  stone  upon 
which  armed  sentinels  paced  to  and  fro.  In  one  face  of  the 
wall  was  a  single  gate  of  massive  iron,  strongly  guarded.  While 
admiring  the  cyclopean  architecture  of  the  "reverend  pile"  I 
was  accosted  by  a  man  in  uniform,  evidently  The  Warden,  with 
a  cheerful  salutation. 

"Colonel,"  I  said,  pressing  his  hand,  "it  gives  me  pleasure 
to  find  some  one  that  I  can  believe.  Pray  tell  me  what  is  this 
building." 

"That,"  said  the  colonel,  "is  the  new  State  penitentiary. 
It  is  one  of  twelve,  all  alike." 

"You  surprise  me,"  I  replied.  "Surely  the  criminal  element 
must  have  increased  enormously." 

"Yes,  indeed,"  he  assented;  "under  the  Reform  regime, 
which  began  in  your  day,  it  became  so  powerful,  bold  and  fierce 
that  arrests  were  no  longer  possible  and  the  prisons  then  in  ex 
istence  were  soon  overcrowded.  The  State  was  compelled  to 
erect  others  of  greater  capacity." 

"But,  Colonel,"  I  protested,  "if  the  criminals  were  too  bold 
and  powerful  to  be  taken  into  custody,  of  what  use  are  the 
prisons?  And  how  are  they  crowded?" 

He  fixed  upon  me  a  look  that  I  could  not  fail  to  interpret 
as  expressing  a  doubt  of  my  sanity.  "What?"  he  said,  "is  it 
possible  that  the  modern  Penology  is  unknown  to  you?  Do 
you  suppose  we  practise  the  antiquated  and  ineffective  method 

138 


The  Death  Penalty 


of  shutting  up  the  rascals?  Sir,  the  growth  of  the  criminal 
element  has,  as  I  said,  compelled  the  erection  of  more  and  larger 
prisons.  We  have  enough  to  hold  comfortably  all  the  honest 
men  and  women  of  the  State.  Within  these  protecting  walls 
they  carry  on  all  the  necessary  vocations  of  life  excepting  com 
merce.  That  is  necessarily  in  the  hands  of  the  rogues  as 
before." 

"Venerated  representative  of  Reform,"  I  exclaimed,  wring 
ing  his  hand  with  effusion,  "you  are  Knowledge,  you  are  His 
tory,  you  are  the  Higher  Education!  We  must  talk  further. 
Come,  let  us  enter  this  benign  edifice;  you  shall  show  me  your 
dominion  and  instruct  me  in  the  rules.  You  shall  propose  me 
as  an  inmate." 

I  walked  rapidly  to  the  gate.  When  challenged  by  the 
sentinel,  I  turned  to  summon  my  instructor.  He  was  nowhere 
visible:  desolate  and  forbidding,  as  about  the  broken  statue 
of  Ozymandias, 

"The  lone  and  level  sands  stretched  far  away." 


139 


Religion 


Religion 


I. 

HIS  is  my  ultimate  and  determining  test  of  right — 
"What,  in  the  circumstances,  would  Christ  have 
done?" — the  Christ  of  the  New  Testament,  not 
^^  the    Christ    of    the    commentators,    theologians, 

priests  and  parsons.  The  test  is  perhaps  not  infallible,  but  it 
is  exceedingly  simple  and  gives  as  good  practical  results  as  any. 
I  am  not  a  Christian,  but  so  far  as  I  know,  the  best  and  truest 
and  sweetest  character  in  literature,  is  next  to  Buddha,  Jesus 
Christ.  He  taught  nothing  new  in  goodness,  for  all  goodness 
was  ages  old  before  he  came;  but  with  an  almost  infallible 
intuition  he  applied  to  life  and  conduct  the  entire  law  of 
righteousness.  He  was  a  lightning  moral  calculator:  to  his 
luminous  intelligence  the  statement  of  the  problem  carried  the 
solution — he  could  not  hesitate,  he  seldom  erred.  That  upon 
his  deeds  and  words  was  founded  a  religion  which  in  a  de 
based  form  persists  and  even  spreads  to  this  day  is  mere  attesta 
tion  of  his  marvelous  gift:  adoration  is  a  primitive  mode  of 
recognition. 

It  seems  a  pity  that  this  wonderful  man  had  not  a  longer 
life  under  more  complex  conditions — conditions  more  nearly 
identical  with  those  of  the  modern  world  and  the  future.  One 
would  like  to  be  able  to  see,  through  the  eyes  of  his  biographers, 
his  genius  applied  to  more  and  more  difficult  questions.  Yet 
one  can  hardly  go  wrong  in  inference  of  his  thought  and  act. 
In  many  of  the  complexities  and  entanglements  of  modern 

143 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

affairs  it  is  no  easy  matter  to  find  an  answer  off-hand  to  the 
question,  "What  is  it  right  to  do?"  But  put  it  in  another 
way:  "What  would  Christ  have  done?"  and  lo!  there  is  light! 
Doubt  spreads  her  bat-like  wings  and  is  away ;  the  sun  of  truth 
springs  into  the  sky,  splendoring  the  path  of  right  and  marking 
that  of  error  with  a  deeper  shade. 

II. 

Gentlemen  of  the  secular  press  dealt  with  the  Rev.  Mr. 
Sheldon  not  altogether  fairly.  To  some  very  relevant  consider 
ations  they  gave  no  weight.  It  was  not  fair,  for  example,  to  say, 
as  the  distinguished  editor  of  the  "North  American  Review" 
did,  that  in  professing  to  conduct  a  daily  newspaper  for  a  week 
as  he  conceived  that  Christ  would  have  conducted  it,  Mr. 
Sheldon  acted  the  part  of  "a  notoriety  seeking  mountebank." 
It  seldom  is  fair  to  go  into  the  question  of  motive,  for  that  is 
something  upon  which  one  has  the  least  light,  even  when  the 
motive  is  one's  own.  The  motives  that  we  think  dominate  us 
seem  simple  and  obvious;  they  are  in  most  instances  exceed 
ingly  complex  and  obscure.  Complacently  surveying  the 
wreck  and  ruin  that  he  has  wrought,  even  that  great  anarch, 
the  "well  meaning  person,"  can  not  have  entire  assurance  that 
he  meant  as  well  as  the  disastrous  results  appear  to  him  to  show. 

The  trouble  with  Mr.  Harvey  of  the  "Review"  was  in 
ability  to  put  himself  in  another's  place  if  that  happened  to  be 
at  any  considerable  distance  from  his  own  place.  He  made  no 
allowance  for  the  difference  in  the  point  of  view — for  the 
difference,  that  is,  between  his  mind  and  the  mind  of  Mr. 
Sheldon.  If  Mr.  Harvey  had  undertaken  to  conduct  that 
Kansas  newspaper  as  Christ  would  have  done  he  would  indeed 

144 


Religion 

have  been  "a  notoriety  seeking  mountebank,"  or  some  similarly 
unenviable  thing,  for  only  a  selfish  purpose  could  persuade  him 
to  an  obviously  resultless  work.  But  Mr.  Sheldon  was  dif 
ferent — his  was  the  religious  mind — a  mind  having  faith  in 
an  "overruling"  Providence  who  can,  and  frequently  does, 
interfere  with  the  orderly  relation  of  cause  and  effect,  accom 
plishing  an  end  by  means  otherwise  inadequate  to  its  produc 
tion.  Believing  himself  a  faithful  servant  of  that  Power,  and 
asking  daily  for  its  interposition  for  promotion  of  a  highly 
moral  purpose,  why  should  he  not  have  expected  his  favor  to 
the  enterprise?  To  expect  that  was,  in  Mr.  Sheldon,  natural, 
reasonable,  wise ;  his  folly  lay  in  believing  in  conditions  making 
it  expectable.  A  person  convinced  that  the  law  of  gravitation 
is  suspended  is  no  fool  for  walking  into  a  bog.  Mr.  Harvey 
may  understand,  but  Mr.  Sheldon  can  not  understand,  that 
Jesus  Christ  would  not  edit  a  newspaper  at  all. 

The  religious  mind,  it  should  be  understood,  is  not  logical. 
It  may  acquire,  as  Whateley's  did,  a  certain  familiarity  with 
the  syllogism  as  an  abstraction,  but  of  the  syllogism's  practical 
application,  its  real  relation  to  the  phenomena  of  thought,  the 
religious  mind  can  know  nothing.  That  is  merely  to  say  that 
the  mind  congenitally  gifted  with  the  power  of  logic  and 
accessible  to  its  light  and  leading  does  not  take  to  religion, 
which  is  a  matter,  not  of  reason,  but  of  feeling — not  of  the 
head,  but  of  the  heart.  Religions  are  conclusions  for  which 
the  facts  of  nature  supply  no  major  premises.  They  are  accepted 
or  rejected  according  to  the  original  mental  make-up  of  the  per 
son  to  whom  they  appeal  for  recognition.  Believers  and  un 
believers  are  like  two  boys  quarreling  across  a  wall.  Each  got 
to  his  place  by  means  of  a  ladder.  They  may  fight  if  they  will, 
but  neither  can  kick  away  the  other's  support. 

145 


The  Shadoiv  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

Believing  the  things  that  he  did  believe,  Mr.  Sheldon  was 
entirely  right  in  thinking  that  the  main  purpose  of  a  news 
paper  should  be  the  salvation  of  souls.  If  his  religious  belief  is 
true  that  should  be  the  main  purpose,  not  only  of  a  news 
paper,  but  of  everything  that  has  a  purpose,  or  can  be  given 
one.  If  we  have  immortal  souls  and  the  consequences  of  our 
deeds  in  the  body  reach  over  into  another  life  in  another  world, 
determining  there  our  eternal  state  of  happiness  or  pain,  that 
is  the  most  momentous  fact  conceivable.  It  is  the  only  momen 
tous  fact;  all  others  are  chaff  and  rags.  A  man  who,  believ 
ing  it  to  be  a  fact,  does  not  make  it  the  one  purpose  of  his 
life  to  save  his  soul  and  the  souls  of  others  that  are  willing  to  be 
saved  is  a  fool  and  a  rogue.  If  he  think  that  any  part  of  this 
only  needful  work  can  be  done  by  turning  a  newspaper  into 
a  gruelpot  he  ought  to  do  so  or  (preferably)  perish  in  the 
attempt. 

The  talk  of  degrading  the  sacred  name,  and  all  that,  is 
mostly  nonsense.  If  one  may  not  test  his  conduct  in  this  life  by 
reference  to  the  highest  standard  that  his  religion  affords  it 
is  not  easy  to  see  how  religion  is  to  be  made  anything  but  a 
mere  body  of  doctrine.  I  do  not  think  the  Christian  religion 
will  ever  be  seriously  discredited  by  an  attempt  to  determine, 
even  with  too  dim  a  light,  what,  under  given  circumstances,  the 
man  miscalled  its  "founder"  would  do.  What  else  is  his 
great  example  good  for?  But  it  is  not  always  enough  to  ask 
oneself,  "How  would  Christ  do  this?"  One  should  first  con 
sider  whether  Christ  would  do  it.  It  is  conceivable  that  certain 
of  his  thrifty  contemporaries  may  have  asked  him  how  he 
would  change  money  in  the  Temple. 

If  Mr.  Sheldon's  critics  were  unfair  his  defenders  were,  as 
a  rule,  not  much  better.  They  meant  to  be  fair,  but  they  had 

146 


Religi 


ion 


to  be  foolish.  For  example,  there  is  the  Rev.  Dr.  Parkhurst, 
whose  defence  was  published  with  Mr.  Harvey's  attack.  I 
shall  give  a  single  illustration  of  how  this  more  celebrated  than 
cerebrated  "divine"  is  pleased  to  think  that  he  thinks.  He  is 
replying  to  some  one's  application  to  this  matter  of  Christ's 
injunction,  "Lay  not  up  for  yourselves  treasures  on  earth." 
This  command,  he  gravely  says,  "is  not  against  money,  nor 
against  the  making  of  money,  but  against  the  loving  it  for  its 
own  sake  and  the  dedicating  of  it  to  self-aggrandizing  uses." 
I  call  this  a  foolish  utterance,  because  it  violates  the  good  old 
rule  of  not  telling  an  obvious  falsehood.  In  no  word  nor  syl 
lable  does  Christ's  injunction  give  the  least  color  of  truth  to 
the  reverend  gentleman's  "interpretation;"  that  is  the  reverend 
gentleman's  very  own,  and  doubtless  he  feels  an  honest  pride 
in  it.  It  is  the  product  of  a  controversial  need — a  character 
istic  attempt  to  crawl  out  of  a  hole  in  an  enclosure  which  he  was 
not  invited  to  enter.  The  words  need  no  "interpretation;"  are 
capable  of  none;  are  as  clear  and  unambiguous  a  proposition 
as  language  can  frame.  Moreover,  they  are  consistent  with  all 
that  we  think  we  know  of  their  author's  life  and  character,  for 
he  not  only  lived  in  poverty  and  taught  poverty  as  a  blessing, 
but  commanded  it  as  a  duty  and  a  means  of  salvation.  The 
probable  effect  of  universal  obedience  among  those  who  adore 
him  as  a  god  is  not  at  present  an  urgent  question.  I  think  even 
so  faithful  a  disciple  as  the  Rev.  Dr.  Parkhurst  has  still  a 
place  to  lay  his  head,  a  little  of  the  wherewithal  to  be  clothed, 
and  a  good  deal  of  the  power  of  interpretation  to  excuse  it. 


147 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

III. 

There  are  other  hypocrites  than  those  of  the  pulpit.  Dr. 
Catling,  the  ingenious  scoundrel  who  invented  the  gun  that 
bears  his  name  with  commendable  fortitude,  says  he  has  given 
much  thought  to  the  task  of  bringing  the  forces  of  war  to  such 
perfection  that  war  will  be  no  more.  Commonly  the  man  who 
talks  of  war  becoming  so  destructive  as  to  be  impossible  is  only 
a  harmless  lunatic,  but  this  fellow  utters  his  cant  to  conceal 
his  cupidity.  If  he  thought  there  was  any  danger  of  the 
nations  beating  their  swords  into  plowshares  we  should  see 
him  "take  the  stump*'  against  agriculture  forthwith.  The  same 
is  true  of  all  military  inventors.  They  are  lions*  parasites; 
themselves,  of  cold  blood  they  fatten  upon  hot.  The  sheep- 
tick's  paler  fare  is  not  at  all  to  their  taste. 

I  sometimes  wish  I  were  a  preacher:  preachers  do  so 
blindly  ignore  their  shining  opportunities.  I  am  indifferently 
versed  in  theology — whereof,  so  help  me  Heaven,  I  do  not 
believe  one  word — but  know  something  of  religion.  I  know, 
for  example,  that  Jesus  Christ  was  no  soldier;  that  war  has 
two  essential  features  which  did  not  command  His  approval: 
aggression  and  defence.  No  man  can  either  attack  or  defend 
and  remain  Christian;  and  if  no  man,  no  nation.  I  could 
quote  texts  by  the  hour  proving  that  Christ  taught  not  only 
absolute  abstention  from  violence  but  absolute  non-resistance. 
Now  what  do  we  see?  Nearly  all  the  so-called  Christian 
nations  of  the  world  sweating  and  groaning  under  their  burdens 
of  debt  contracted  in  violation  of  these  injunctions  which  they 
believe  divine — contracted  in  perfecting  their  means  of  offense 
and  defense.  "We  must  have  the  best,**  they  cry;  and  if  armor 
plates  for  ships  were  better  when  alloyed  with  silver,  and  guns 

148 


Religi 


ion 


if  banded  with  gold,  such  armor  plates  would  be  put  upon  the 
ships,  such  guns  would  be  freely  made.  No  sooner  does  one 
nation  adopt  some  rascal's  costly  device  for  taking  life  or  pro 
tecting  it  from  the  taker  (and  these  soulless  inventors  will  as 
readily  sell  the  product  of  their  malign  ingenuity  to  one  nation 
as  to  another)  than  all  the  rest  either  possess  themselves  of  it 
or  adopt  something  superior  and  more  expensive;  and  so  all 
pay  the  penalty  for  the  sins  of  each.  A  hundred  million 
dollars  is  a  moderate  estimate  of  what  it  has  cost  the  world  to 
abstain  from  strangling  the  infant  Catling  in  his  cradle. 

You  may  say,  if  you  will,  that  primitive  Christianity — the 
Christianity  of  Christ — is  not  adapted  to  these  rough-and- 
tumble  times;  that  it  is  not  a  practical  scheme  of  conduct.  As 
you  please;  I  have  not  undertaken  to  say  what  it  is  not,  but 
what  it  partly  is.  I  am  no  Christian,  though  I  think  that  Christ 
probably  knew  what  was  good  for  man  about  as  well  as 
Dr.  Catling  or  the  United  States  Ordnance  Office.  It  is  not 
for  me  to  defend  Christianity;  Christ  did  not.  Nevertheless, 
I  can  not  forbear  the  wish  that  I  were  a  preacher,  in  order 
sincerely  to  affirm  that  the  awful  burdens  borne  by  modern 
nations  are  obvious  judgments  of  Heaven  for  disobedience  to 
the  Prince  of  Peace.  What  a  striking  theme  to  kindle  fires 
upon  the  heights  of  imagination — to  fill  the  secret  sources  of 
eloquence — to  stir  the  very  stones  in  the  temple  of  truth !  What 
a  noble  subject  for  the  pious  gentlemen  who  serve  (with  rank, 
pay  and  allowances)  as  chaplains  in  the  Army  and  the  Navy, 
or  the  civilian  divines  who  offer  prayer  at  the  launching  of  an 
ironclad ! 


149 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

IV. 

A  matter  of  missionaries  commonly  is  to  the  fore  as  a  cause 
of  quarrel  among  nations  which  have  the  hardihood  to  prefer 
their  own  religions  to  ours.  Missionaries  constitute,  in  truth, 
a  perpetual  menace  to  the  national  peace.  I  dare  say  the  most 
of  them  are  conscientious  men  and  women  of  a  certain  order 
of  intellect.  They  believe,  and  from  the  way  that  they  inter 
pret  their  sacred  book  have  some  reason  to  believe,  that  in 
meddling  uninvited  with  the  spiritual  affairs  of  others  they  per 
form  a  work  acceptable  to  God — their  God.  They  think  they 
discern  a  moral  difference  between  "approaching"  a  man  of 
another  religion  about  the  state  of  his  soul  and  approaching 
him  on  the  condition  of  his  linen  or  the  character  of  his  wife. 
I  think  there  is  no  difference.  I  have  observed  that  the  person 
who  volunteers  an  interest  in  my  spiritual  welfare  is  the  same 
person  from  whom  I  must  expect  an  impudent  concern  about 
my  temporal  affairs.  The  missionary  is  one  who  goes  about 
throwing  open  the  shutters  of  other  men's  bosoms  in  order  to 
project  upon  the  blank  walls  a  shadow  of  himself. 

No  ruler  nor  government  of  sense  would  willingly  permit 
foreigners  to  sap  the  foundation  of  the  national  religion.  No 
ruler  nor  government  ever  does  permit  it  except  under  the  stress 
of  compulsion.  It  is  through  the  people's  religion  that  a  wise 
government  governs  wisely — even  in  our  own  country  we  make 
only  a  transparent  pretense  of  officially  ignoring  Christianity, 
and  a  pretense  only  because  we  have  so  many  kinds  of  Chris 
tians,  all  jealous  and  inharmonious.  Each  sect  would  make 
this  a  Theocracy  if  it  could,  and  would  then  make  short  work 
of  any  missionary  from  abroad.  Happily  all  religions  but  ours 
have  the  sloth  and  timidity  of  error;  Christianity  alone,  draw- 
ISO 


Religi 


ion 


ing  vigor  from  eternal  truth,  is  courageous  enough  and  ener 
getic  enough  to  make  itself  a  nuisance  to  people  of  every  other 
faith.  The  Jew  not  only  does  not  bid  for  converts,  but  dis 
courages  them  by  imposition  of  hard  conditions,  and  the 
Moslem  True  Believer's  simple,  forthright  method  of  reducing 
error  is  to  cut  off  the  head  holding  it.  I  don't  say  that  this 
is  right;  I  say  only  that,  being  practical  and  comprehensible, 
it  commands  a  certain  respect  from  the  impartial  observer  not 
conversant  with  scriptural  justification  of  the  other  practice. 

It  is  only  where  the  missionaries  have  made  themselves 
hated  that  there  is  any  molestation  of  Europeans  engaged  in  the 
affairs  of  this  world.  Chinese  antipathy  to  Caucasians  in  China 
is  neither  a  racial  animosity  nor  a  religious;  it  is  an  instinctive 
dislike  of  persons  who  will  not  mind  their  own  business. 
China  has  been  infested  with  missionaries  from  the  earliest 
centuries  of  our  era,  and  they  have  rarely  been  molested  when 
they  have  taken  the  trouble  to  behave  themselves.  In  the  time 
of  the  Emperor  Justinian  the  fact  that  the  Christian  religion  was 
openly  preached  throughout  China  enabled  that  sovereign  to 
wrest  from  the  Chinese  the  jealously-guarded  secret  of  silk- 
making.  He  sent  two  monks  to  Pekin,  who  alternately 
preached  seriousness  and  studied  sericulture,  and  who  brought 
away  silkworms'  eggs  concealed  in  sticks. 

In  religious  matters  the  Chinese  are  more  tolerant  than  we. 
They  let  the  religions  of  others  alone,  but  naturally  and 
rightly  demand  that  others  shall  let  theirs  alone.  In  China,  as 
in  other  Oriental  countries  where  the  color  line  is  not  drawn  and 
where  slavery  itself  is  a  light  affliction,  the  mental  attitude  of 
the  zealot  who  finds  gratification  in  "spreading  the  light"  of 
which  he  deems  himself  custodian,  is  not  understood.  Like 

151 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

most  things  not  understood,  it  is  felt  to  be  bad,  and  is  indubit 
ably  offensive. 

V. 

At  a  church  club  meeting  a  paper  was  read  by  a  minister 
entitled,  "Why  the  Masses  Do  not  Attend  the  Churches." 
This  good  and  pious  man  was  not  ashamed  to  account  for  it 
by  the  fact  that  there  is  no  Sunday  law,  and  "the  masses"  can 
find  recreation  elsewhere,  even  in  the  drinking  saloons.  It  is 
frank  of  him  to  admit  that  he  and  his  professional  brethren  have 
not  brains  enough  to  make  religious  services  more  attractive 
than  shaking  dice  for  cigars  or  playing  cards  for  drink;  but  if 
it  is  a  fact  he  must  not  expect  the  local  government  to  assist  in 
spreading  the  gospel  by  rounding-up  the  people  and  corralling 
them  in  the  churches.  The  truth  is,  and  this  gentleman  suspects 
it,  that  "the  masses"  stay  out  of  hearing  of  his  pulpit  because  he 
talks  nonsense  of  the  most  fatiguing  kind;  they  would  rather 
do  any  one  of  a  thousand  other  things  than  go  to  hear  it. 
These  parsons  are  like  a  scolding  wife  who  grieves  because  her 
husband  will  not  pass  his  evenings  with  her.  The  more  she 
grieves,  the  more  she  scolds  and  the  more  diligently  he  keeps 
away  from  her.  I  don't  think  Jack  Satan  is  conspicuously 
wise,  but  he  is  in  the  main  a  good  entertainer,  with  a  right 
pretty  knack  at  making  people  come  again;  but  the  really 
reprehensible  part  of  his  performance  is  not  the  part  that 
attracts  them.  The  parsons  might  study  his  methods  with 
great  advantage  to  religion  and  morality. 

It  may  be  urged  that  religious  services  have  not  entertain 
ment  for  their  object.  But  the  people,  when  not  engaged  in 
business  or  labor,  have  it  for  their  object.  If  the  clergy  do  not 
choose  to  adapt  their  ministrations  to  the  characters  of  those  to 

152 


Religion 


whom  they  wish  to  minister,  that  is  their  own  affair;  but  let 
them  accept  the  consequences.  "The  masses"  move  along  the 
line  of  least  reluctance.  They  do  not  really  enjoy  Sunday  at 
all;  they  try  to  get  through  the  day  in  the  manner  that  is 
least  wearisome  to  the  spirit.  Possibly  their  taste  is  not  what 
it  ought  to  be.  If  this  minister  were  a  physician  of  bodies  in 
stead  of  souls,  and  patients  who  had  not  called  him  in  should 
refuse  to  take  the  medicine  which  he  thought  his  best  and  they 
his  nastiest,  he  should  either  offer  them  another,  a  little  less 
disagreeable  if  a  little  less  efficacious,  or  let  them  alone.  In 
no  case  is  he  justified  in  asking  the  civil  authority  to  hold  their 
noses  while  he  plies  the  spoon. 

"The  masses"  have  not  asked  for  churches  and  services; 
they  really  do  not  care  for  anything  of  the  kind — whether  they 
ought  is  another  matter.  If  the  clergy  choose  to  supply  them, 
that  is  well  and  worthy.  But  they  should  understand  their 
relation  to  the  impenitent  worldling,  which  is  precisely  that  of  a 
physician  without  a  mandate  from  the  patient,  who  may  not 
be  convinced  that  there  is  very  much  the  matter  with  him.  The 
physician  may  have  a  diploma  and  a  State  certificate  authoriz 
ing  him  to  practise,  but  if  the  patient  do  not  deem  himself 
bound  to  be  practised  upon  has  the  physician  a  right  to  make 
him  miserable  until  he  will  submit?  Clearly,  he  has  not.  If 
he  can  not  persuade  him  to  come  to  the  dispensary  and  take 
medicine  there  is  an  end  to  the  matter,  and  he  may  justly  con 
clude  that  he  is  misfitted  to  his  vocation. 

I  am  sure  that  the  ministers  and  that  singularly  small  con 
tingent  of  earnest  and,  on  the  whole,  pretty  good  persons  who 
cluster  about  them  do  not  perceive  how  alien  they  are  in  their 
convictions,  tastes,  sympathies  and  general  mental  habitudes  to 

153 


The  Shadow  on   the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

the  great  majority  of  their  fellow  men  and  women.  Their  voices, 
like  "the  gushing  wave"  which,  to  the  ears  of  the  lotus-eaters, 

"Far,  far  away  did  seem  to  mourn  and  rave,** 

come  to  us  as  from  beyond  a  great  gulf — mere  ghosts  of  sound, 
almost  destitute  of  signification.  We  know  that  they  would 
have  us  do  something,  but  what  it  is  we  do  not  clearly  appre 
hend.  We  feel  that  they  are  concerned  for  us,  but  why  we 
are  imperfectly  able  to  conceive.  In  an  intelligible  tongue  they 
tell  us  of  unthinkable  things.  Here  and  there  in  the  discourse 
we  catch  a  word,  a  phrase,  a  sentence — something  which,  from 
ancestors  whose  mother-speech  it  was,  we  have  inherited  the 
capacity  to  understand;  but  the  homily  as  a  whole  is  devoid 
of  meaning.  Solemn  and  sonorous  enough  it  all  is,  and  not  un 
musical,  but  it  lacks  its  natural  accompaniment  of  shawm  and 
sackbut  and  the  wind-swept  harp  in  the  willows  by  the  waters 
of  Babylon.  It  is,  in  fact,  something  of  a  survival — the 
memory  of  a  dream. 

VI. 

The  first  week  of  January  is  set  apart  as  a  week  of  prayer. 
It  is  a  custom  of  more  than  a  half  century's  age,  and  it  seems 
that  "gracious  answers  have  been  received  in  proportion  to  the 
earnestness  and  unanimity  of  the  petitions.**  That  is  to  say, 
in  this  world's  speech,  the  more  Christians  that  have  prayed 
and  the  more  they  have  meant  it,  the  better  the  result  is  known 
to  have  been.  I  don't  believe  all  that.  I  don't  believe  that 
when  God  is  asked  to  do  something  that  he  had  not  intended 
to  do  he  counts  noses  before  making  up  his  mind  whether  to  do 
it  or  not.  God  probably  knows  the  character  of  his  work,  and 

154 


Religion 


knowing  that  he  has  made  this  a  world  of  knaves  and  dunces  he 
must  know  that  the  more  of  them  that  ask  for  something,  and 
the  more  loudly  they  ask,  the  stronger  is  the  presumption  that 
they  ought  not  to  have  it.  And  I  think  God  is  perhaps  less 
concerned  about  his  popularity  than  some  good  folk  seem  to 
suppose. 

Doubtless  there  are  errors  in  the  record  of  results — some 
things  set  down  as  "answers"  to  prayer  which  came  about 
through  the  orderly  operation  of  natural  laws  and  would  have 
occurred  anyhow.     I  am  told  that  similar  errors  have  been 
made,  or  are  believed  to  have  been  made,  in  the  past.  In  1  730, 
for  example,   a  good   Bishop  at  Auvergne  prayed   for  an 
eclipse  of  the  sun  as  a  warning  to  unbelievers.     The  eclipse 
ensued  and  the  pious  prelate  made  the  most  of  it;  but  when  it 
was  shown  that  the  astronomers  of  the  period  had  foretold  it 
She  was  a  sufferer  from  irreverent  gibes.     A  monk  of  Treves 
prayed  that  an  enemy  of  the  church,  then  in  Paris,  might 
lose  his  head,  and  it  fell  off;  but  it  transpired  that,  unknown 
'(or  known)  to  the  monk,  the  man  was  under  sentence  of  de 
capitation  when  the  prayer  was  made.      This   is   related   by 
Ausolus,  who  piously  explains,  however,  that  but  for  the  prayer 
Ithe  sentence  might  perhaps  have  been  commuted  to  service 
rin  the  galleys.     I  have  myself  known  a  minister  to  pray  for 
rain,  and  the  rain  came.     Perhaps  you  can  conceive  his  dis 
comfiture  when  I  showed  him  that  the  weather  bureau  had 
^previously  predicted  a  fair  day. 

I  do  not  object  to  a  week  of  prayer.  But  why  only  a 
week?  If  prayer  is  "answered"  Christians  ought  to  pray  all 
the  time.  That  prayer  is  "answered"  the  Scripture  affirms  as 
oositively  and  unequivocally  as  anything  can  be  affirmed  in 
words:  "All  things  whatsoever  ye  shall  ask  in  prayer,  believing, 

155 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

that  ye  shall  receive."  Why,  then,  when  all  the  clergy  of  this 
country  prayed  publicly  for  the  recovery  of  President 
McKinley,  did  the  man  die?  Why  is  it  that  although  two 
pious  Chaplains  ask  almost  daily  that  goodness  and  wisdom 
may  descend  upon  Congress,  Congress  remains  wicked  and 
unwise?  Why  is  it  that  although  in  all  the  churches  and  half 
the  dwellings  of  the  land  God  is  continually  asked  for  good 
government,  good  government  remains  what  it  always  and 
everywhere  has  been,  a  dream?  From  Earth  to  Heaven  in 
unceasing  ascension  flows  a  stream  of  prayer  for  every  blessing 
that  man  desires,  yet  man  remains  unblest,  the  victim  of  his  own 
folly  and  passions,  the  sport  of  fire,  flood,  tempest  and  earth 
quake,  afflicted  with  famine  and  disease,  war,  poverty  and 
crime,  his  world  an  incredible  welter  of  evil,  his  life  a  labor 
and  his  hope  a  lie.  Is  it  possible  that  all  this  praying  is  futilized 
and  invalidated  by  the  lack  of  faith? — that  the  "asking"  is 
not  credentialed  by  the  "believing?"  When  the  anointed 
minister  of  Heaven  spreads  his  palms  and  uprolls  his  eyes  to 
beseech  a  general  blessing  or  some  special  advantage  is  he  the 
celebrant  of  a  hollow,  meaningless  rite,  or  the  dupe  of  a  false 
promise?  One  does  not  know,  but  if  one  is  not  a  fool  one  does 
know  that  his  every  resultless  petition  proves  him  by  the  in 
exorable  laws  of  logic  to  be  the  one  or  the  other. 

VII. 

Modern  Christianity  is  beautiful  exceedingly,  and  he  who 
admires  not  is  eyed  batly  and  minded  as  the  mole.  "Sell  all 
thou  hast,"  said  Christ  and  "give  to  the  poor."  All — no  less 
— in  order  "to  be  saved."  The  poor  were  Christ's  peculiar 
care.  Ever  for  them  and  their  privations,  and  not  greatly  for 

156 


Religion 


their  spiritual  darkness,  fell  from  his  lips  the  compassionate 
word,  the  mandate  divine  for  their  relief  and  cherishing. 
Of  foreign  missions,  of  home  missions,  of  mission  schools,  of 
church  buildings,  of  work  among  pagans  in  partibus  infidelium, 
of  work  among  sailors,  of  communion  table,  of  delegates  to 
councils — of  any  of  these  things  he  knew  no  more  than  the 
moon  man.  They  were  inventions  of  others,  as  is  the  entire 
florid  and  flamboyant  fabric  of  ecclesiasticism  that  has  been 
reared,  stone  by  stone  and  century  after  century,  upon  his  sim 
ple  life  and  works  and  words.  "Founder,"  indeed!  He 
founded  nothing,  instituted  nothing;  Paul  did  all  that.  Christ 
simply  went  about  doing,  and  being,  good — admonishing  the 
rich,  whom  he  regarded  as  criminals,  comforting  the  luckless 
and  uttering  wisdom  with  that  Oriental  indirection  wherein 
our  stupid  ingenuity  finds  imaginary  warrant  for  all  desider 
ated  pranks  and  fads. 


157 


Immortality 


Immortality 


|HE  desire  for  life  everlasting  has  commonly  been 
affirmed  to  be  universal — at  least  that  is  the  view 
taken  by  those  unacquainted  with  Oriental  faiths 
and  with  Oriental  character.  Those  of  us  whose 
knowledge  is  a  trifle  wider  are  not  prepared  to  say  that  the 
desire  is  universal  or  even  general. 

If  the  devout  Buddhist,  for  example,  wishes  to  "live 
alway,"  he  has  not  succeeded  in  very  clearly  formulating  the 
desire.  The  sort  of  thing  that  he  is  pleased  to  hope  for  is  not 
what  we  should  call  life,  and  not  what  many  of  us  would  care 
for. 

When  a  man  says  that  everybody  has  "a  horror  of  annihi 
lation,"  we  may  be  very  sure  that  he  has  not  many  opportuni 
ties  for  observation,  or  that  he  has  not  availed  himself  of  all 
that  he  has.  Most  persons  go  to  sleep  rather  gladly,  yet  sleep 
is  virtual  annihilation  while  it  lasts ;  and  if  it  should  last  forever 
the  sleeper  would  be  no  worse  off  after  a  million  years  of  it 
than  after  an  hour  of  it.  There  are  minds  sufficiently  logical 
to  think  of  it  that  way,  and  to  them  annihilation  is  not  a  dis 
agreeable  thing  to  contemplate  and  expect. 

In  this  matter  of  immortality,  people's  beliefs  appear  to  go 
along  with  their  wishes.  The  chap  who  is  content  with  anni 
hilation  thinks  he  will  get  it;  those  that  want  immortality  are 
pretty  sure  they  are  immortal,  and  that  is  a  very  comfortable 
allotment  of  faiths.  The  few  of  us  that  are  left  unprovided 

161 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

for  are  those  who  don't  bother  themselves  much  about  the 
matter,  one  way  or  another. 

The  question  of  human  immortality  is  the  most  momentous 
that  the  mind  is  capable  of  conceiving.  If  it  is  a  fact  that  the 
dead  live,  all  other  facts  are  in  comparison  trivial  and  without 
interest.  The  prospect  of  obtaining  certain  knowledge  with 
regard  to  this  stupendous  matter  is  not  encouraging.  In  all 
countries  but  those  in  barbarism  the  powers  of  the  profoundest 
and  most  penetrating  intelligences  have  been  ceaselessly  ad 
dressed  to  the  task  of  glimpsing  a  life  beyond  this  life;  yet 
today  no  one  can  truly  say  that  he  knows.  It  is  still  as  much 
a  matter  of  faith  as  ever  it  was. 

Our  modern  Christian  nations  hold  a  passionate  hope  and 
belief  in  another  world,  yet  the  most  popular  writer  and 
speaker  of  his  time,  the  man  whose  lectures  drew  the  largest 
audiences,  the  work  of  whose  pen  brought  him  the  highest 
rewards,  was  he  who  most  strenuously  strove  to  destroy 
the  ground  of  that  hope  and  unsettle  the  foundations  of  that 
belief. 

The  famous  and  popular  Frenchman,  Professor  of  Spec 
tacular  Astronomy,  Camille  Flammarion,  affirms  immortality 
because  he  has  talked  with  departed  souls  who  said  that  it  was 
true.  Yes,  Monsieur,  but  surely  you  know  the  rule  about 
hearsay  evidence.  We  Anglo-Saxons  are  very  particular 
about  that.  Your  testimony  is  of  that  character. 

M.  Flammarion  says: 

"I  don't  repudiate  the  presumptive  arguments  of  school 
men.  I  merely  supplement  them  with  something  positive.  For 
instance,  if  you  assumed  the  existence  of  God  this  argument  of 
the  scholastics  is  a  good  one.  God  has  implanted  in  all  men 
the  desire  of  perfect  happiness.  This  desire  can  not  be  satis- 

162 


Immortality 


fied  in  our  lives  here.     If  there  were  not  another  life  wherein 
to  satisfy  it  then  God  would  be  a  deceiver.     Voila  tout." 

There  is  more:  the  desire  of  perfect  happiness  does  not 
imply  immortality,  even  if  there  is  a  God,  for 

( 1 )  God  may  not  have  implanted  it,  but  merely  suffers 
it  to  exist,  as  He  suffers  sin  to  exist,  the  desire  of  wealth,  the 
desire  to  live  longer  than  we  do  in  this  world.     It  is  not  held 
that  God  implanted  all  the  desires  of  the  human  heart.    Then 
why  hold  that  He  implanted  that  of  perfect  happiness? 

(2)  Even  if  He  did — even  if  a  divinely  implanted  de 
sire  entail  its  own  gratification — even  if  it  can  not  be  gratified 
in  this  life — that  does  not  imply  immortality.     It  implies  only 
another  life  long  enough  for  its  gratification  just  once.     An 
eternity  of  gratification  is  not  a  logical  inference  from  it. 

(3)  Perhaps  God  is  "a  deceiver"  who  knows  that  He  is 
not?    Assumption  of  the  existence  of  a  God  is  one  thing;   as 
sumption  of  the  existence  of  a  God  who  is  honorable  and  can 
did  according  to  our  finite  conception  of  honor  and  candor  is 
another. 

(4)  There  may  be  an  honorable  and  candid  God.    He 
may  have  implanted  in  us  the  desire  of  perfect  happiness.     It 
may  be — it  is — impossible  to  gratify  that  desire  in  this  life. 
Still,  another  life  is  not  implied,  for  God  may  not  have  in 
tended  us  to  draw  the  inference  that  He  is  going  to  gratify  it. 
If  omniscient  and  omnipotent,  God  must  be  held  to  have  in 
tended,   whatever  occurs,   but  no   such   God  is   assumed  in 
M.  Flammarion's  illustration,  and  it  may  be  that  God's  knowl 
edge  and  power  are  limited,  or  that  one  of  them  is  limited. 

M.  Flammarion  is  a  learned,  if  somewhat  "yellow,"  as 
tronomer.  He  has  a  tremendous  imagination,  which  naturally 
i  is  more  at  home  in  the  marvelous  and  catastrophic  than  in  the 

163 


The  Shadow   on   the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

orderly  regions  of  familiar  phenomena.  To  him  the  heavens 
are  an  immense  pyrotechnicon  and  he  is  the  master  of  the  show 
and  sets  off  the  fireworks.  But  he  knows  nothing  of  logic, 
which  is  the  science  of  straight  thinking,  and  his  views  of  things 
have  therefore  no  value;  they  are  nebulous. 

Nothing  is  clearer  than  that  our  pre-existence  is  a  dream, 
having  absolutely  no  basis  in  anything  that  we  know  or  can 
hope  to  know.  Of  after-existence  there  is  said  to  be  evidence, 
or  rather  testimony,  in  assurances  of  those  who  are  in  present 
enjoyment  of  it — if  it  is  enjoyable.  Whether  this  testimony 
has  actually  been  given — and  it  is  the  only  testimony  worth  a 
moment's  consideration — is  a  disputed  point.  Many  persons 
while  living  this  life  have  professed  to  have  received  it.  But 
nobody  professes,  or  ever  has  professed,  to  have  received  a 
communication  of  any  kind  from  one  in  actual  experience  of 
the  fore-life.  "The  souls  as  yet  ungarmented,"  if  such  there 
are,  are  dumb  to  question.  The  Land  beyond  the  Grave  has 
been,  if  not  observed,  yet  often  and  variously  described:  if 
not  explored  and  surveyed,  yet  carefully  charted.  From 
among  so  many  accounts  of  it  that  we  have,  he  must  be  fastid 
ious  indeed  who  can  not  be  suited.  But  of  the  Fatherland  that 
spreads  before  the  cradle — the  great  Heretofore,  wherein  we 
all  dwelt  if  we  are  to  dwell  in  the  Hereafter,  we  have  no  ac 
count.  Nobody  professes  knowledge  of  that.  No  testimony 
reaches  our  ears  of  flesh  concerning  its  topographical  or  other 
features;  no  one  has  been  so  enterprising  as  to  wrest  from  its 
actual  inhabitants  any  particulars  of  their  character  and  ap 
pearance,  to  refresh  our  memory  withal.  And  among  edu 
cated  experts  and  professional  proponents  of  worlds  to  be 
there  is  a  general  denial  of  its  existence. 

164 


Immortality 


I  am  of  their  way  of  thinking  about  that.  The  fact  that 
we  have  no  recollection  of  a  former  life  is  entirely  conclusive 
of  the  matter.  To  have  lived  an  unrecollected  life  is  impossible 
and  unthinkable,  for  there  would  be  nothing  to  connect  the 
new  life  with  the  old — no  thread  of  continuity — nothing  that 
persisted  from  the  one  life  to  the  other.  The  later  birth  is  that 
of  another  person,  an  altogether  different  being,  unrelated  to 
the  first — a  new  John  Smith  succeeding  to  the  late  Tom  Jones, 

Let  us  not  be  misled  here  by  a  false  analogy.  Today  I 
may  get  a  thwack  on  the  mazzard  which  will  give  me  an  in 
tervening  season  of  unconsciousness  between  yesterday  and 
tomorrow.  Thereafter  I  may  live  to  a  green  old  age  with  no 
recollection  of  anything  that  I  knew,  or  did,  or  was  before  the 
accident;  yet  I  shall  be  the  same  person,  for  between  the  old 
life  and  the  new  there  will  be  a  nexus,  a  thread  of  continuity, 
something  spanning  the  gulf  from  the  one  state  to  the  other, 
and  the  same  in  both — namely,  my  body  with  its  habits,  ca 
pacities  and  powers.  That  is  I;  that  identifies  me  as  my 
former  self — authenticates  and  credentials  me  as  the  person 
that  incurred  the  cranial  mischance,  dislodging  memory. 

But  when  death  occurs  all  is  dislodged  if  memory  is;  for 
between  two  merely  mental  or  spiritual  existences  memory  is 
the  only  nexus  conceivable;  consciousness  of  identity  is  the 
only  identity.  To  live  again  without  memory  of  having  lived 
before  is  to  live  another.  Re-existence  without  recollection  is 
absurd;  there  is  nothing  to  re-exist. 


165 


Opportunity 


Opportunity 


HIS  is  not  a  country  of  equal  fortunes;  outside  a 
Socialist's  dream  no  such  country  exists  or  can 
exist.  But  as  nearly  as  possible  this  is  a  country 
of  equal  opportunities  for  those  who  begin  life 
with  nothing  but  nature's  endowments — and  of  such  is  the 
^kingdom  of  success. 

In  nine  instances  in  ten  successful  Americans — that  is 
Americans  who  have  succeeded  in  any  worthy  ambition  or  le- 
jgitimate  field  of  endeavor — have  started  with  nothing  but  the 
skin  they  stood  in.  It  almost  may  be  said,  indeed,  that  to  begin 
with  nothing  is  a  main  condition  of  success — in  America. 

To  a  young  man  there  is  no  such  hopeless  impediment  as 
wealth  or  the  expectation  of  wealth.  Here  a  man  and  there  a 
man  will  be  born  so  abundantly  endowed  by  nature  as  to  over 
come  the  handicap  of  artificial  "advantages,"  but  that  is  not 
the  rule;  usually  the  chap  "born  with  a  gold  spoon  in  his 
mouth"  puts  in  his  time  sucking  that  spoon,  and  without  other 
employment.  Counting  possession  of  the  spoon  success,  why 
should  he  bestir  himself  to  achieve  what  he  already  has? 

The  real  curled  darling  of  opportunity  has  nothing  in  his 
mouth  but  his  teeth  and  his  appetite-i-he  knows,  or  is  likely 
<to  know,  what  it  is  to  feel  his  belly  sticking  to  his  back.  I  If  he 
iave  brains  a-plenty  he  will  get  on,  for  he  must  be  up  and  doing 
— the  penalty  of  indiligence  is  famine.  If  he  have  not,  he 
may  up  and  do  to  the  uttermost  satisfaction  of  his  mind  and 
heart,  but  the  end  of  that  man  is  failure,  with  possibly  Social- 
Issm,  that  last  resort  of  conscious  incompetence.  It  fatigues, 

169 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

this  talk  of  the  narrowing  opportunities  of  today,  the  "closed 
avenues  to  success,"  and  the  rest  of  it.  Doubtless  it  serves  its 
purpose  of  making  mischief  for  the  tyrant  trusts  and  the  wicked 
rich  generally,  but  in  a  six  months'  bound  volume  of  it  there  is 
not  enough  of  truth  to  float  a  religion. 

Men  of  brains  never  had  a  better  chance  than  now  to  ac 
complish  all  that  it  is  desirable  that  they  should  accomplish; 
and  men  of  no  brains  never  did  have  much  of  a  chance,  nor 
under  any  possible  conditions  can  have  in  this  country,  nor  in 
any  other.  They  are  nature's  failures,/God's  botchwork.  Let 
us  be  sorry  for  them,  treating  them  justly  and  generously;  but 
the  Socialism  that  would  level  us  all  down  to  their  plane  of 
achievement  and  reward  is  a  proposal  of  which  they  are  them 
selves  the  only  proponents. 

Opportunity,  indeed!  Who  is  holding  me  from  compos 
ing  a  great  opera  that  would  make  me  rich  and  famous? 

What  oppressive  laws  forbade  me  to  work  my  passage  up 
the  Yukon  as  deckhand  on  a  steamboat  and  discover  the  gold 
along  Bonanza  creek? 

What  is  there  in  our  industrial  system  that  conceals  from 
me  the  secret  of  making  diamonds  from  charcoal? 

Why  was  it  not  I  who,  entering  a  lawyer's  office  as  a  suit 
able  person  to  sweep  it  out,  left  it  as  an  appointed  Justice  of 
the  Supreme  Court? 

The  number  of  actual  and  possible  sources  of  profit  and 
methods  of  distinction  is  infinite.  Not  all  the  trusts  in  the 
world  combined  in  one  trust  of  trusts  could  appreciably  reduce 
it — could  condemn  to  permanent  failure  one  man  with  the  tal 
ent  and  the  will  to  succeed.  They  can  abolish  that  doubtful 
benefactor  of  the  "small  dealer,"  who  lives  by  charging  too 
much,  and  that  very  thickly  disguised  blessing  the  "drummer," 

170 


Opportunity 


whom  they  have  to  add  to  the  price  of  everything  they  sell; 
but  for  every  opportunity  they  close  they  open  a  new  one  and 
leave  untouched  a  thousand  actual  and  a  million  possible  ones. 
As  to  their  dishonest  practices,  these  are  conspicuous  and 
striking,  because  "lumped,"  but  no  worse  than  the  silent, 
steady  aggregate  of  cheating  by  which  their  constituent  firms 
and  individuals  formerly  consumed  the  consumer  without  his 
special  wonder. 


171 


Charity 


Chanty 


HE  promoter  of  organized  charity  protests  against 
"the  wasteful  and  mischievous  method  of  undi 
rected  relief."     He  means,  naturally,  relief  that 
is  not  directed  by  somebody  else  than  the  person 
,  giving    it — undirected    by    him    and    his    kind — professional 
almoners — philanthropists  who  deem  it  more  blessed  to  allot 
'than  to  bestow.     Indubitably  much  is  wasted  and  some  mis 
chief  done  by  indiscriminate  giving — and  individual  givers  are 
addicted  to  that  faulty  practice.     But  there  is  something  to  be 
-said  for  "undirected  relief"  quite  the  same.     It  blesses  not  only 
I  him  who  receives  (when  he  is  worthy;   and  when  he  is  not  up 
on  his  own  head  be  it),  but  him  who  gives.    To  those  uncal- 
culating  persons  who,  despite  the  protests  of  the  organized 
charitable,  concede  a  certain  moral  value  to  the  spontaneous 
impulses  of  the  heart  and  read  in  the  word  "relief  a  double 
meaning,  the  office  of  the  mere  distributor  is  imperfectly  sacred. 
iHe  is  even  without  scriptural  authority,  and  lives  in  the  per- 
.petual  challenge  of  a  moral  quo  tvarranto.    Nevertheless  he  is 
mot  without  his  uses.    He  is  a  tapper  of  tills  that  do  not  open 
^automatically.     He  is  almoner  to  the  uncompassionate,  who 
but  for  him  would  give  no  alms.    He  negotiates  unnatural  but 
nnot  censurable  relations  between  selfishness  and  ingratitude. 
The  good  that  he  does  is  purely  material.     He  makes  two 
leaves  of  fat  to  grow  where  but  one  grew  before,  lessens  the 
sum  of  gastric  pangs  and  dorsal  chills.     All  this  is  something, 
certainly,  but  it  generates  no  warm  and  elevated  sentiments  and 
does   nothing  in   mitigation   of   the  poor's  animosity   to   the 

175 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

rich.     Organized  charity  is  a  sapid  and  savorless  thing;    its 
place  among  moral  agencies  is  no  higher  than  that  of  root  beer. 

Christ  did  not  say  "Sell  whatsoever  thou  hast  and  give  to 
the  church  to  give  to  the  poor."  He  did  not  mention  the  As 
sociated  Charities  of  the  period.  I  do  not  find  the  words  "The 
Little  Sisters  of  the  Poor  ye  have  always  with  you,"  nor  "In 
asmuch  as  ye  have  done  it  unto  the  least  of  these  Dorcas 
societies  ye  have  done  it  unto  me."  Nowhere  do  I  find  myself 
commanded  to  enable  others  to  comfort  the  afflicted  and  visit 
the  sick  and  those  in  prison.  Nowhere  is  recorded  God's 
blessing  upon  him  who  makes  himself  a  part  of  a  charity  ma 
chine — no,  not  even  if  he  be  the  guiding  lever  of  the  whole 
mechanism. 

Organized  charity  is  a  delusion  and  a  snare.  It  enables 
Munniglut  to  think  himself  a  good  man  for  paying  annual  dues 
and  buying  transferable  meal  tickets.  Munniglut  is  not 
thereby,  a  good  man.  On  the  Last  Great  Day,  when  he 
cowers  in  the  Ineffable  Presence  and  is  asked  for  an  accounting 
it  will  not  help  him  to  say,  "Hearing  that  A  was  in  want  I 
gave  money  for  his  need  to  B."  Nor  will  it  help  B  to  say, 
"When  A  was  in  distress  I  asked  C  to  relieve  him,  and  myself 
allotted  the  relief  according  to  a  resolution  of  D,  E  and  F." 

There  are  blessings  and  benefactions  that  one  would  will 
ingly  forego — among  them  the  poor.  Quack  remedies  for 
poverty  amuse;  a  real  specific  would  kindle  a  noble  enthusi 
asm.  Yet  the  world  would  lose  much  by  it;  human  nature 
would  suffer  a  change  for  the  worse.  Happily  and  unhappily 
poverty  is  not  abolishable:  "The  poor  ye  have  always  with 
you"  is  a  sentence  that  can  never  become  unintelligible.  Ef 
fect  of  a  thousand  causes,  poverty  is  invincible,  eternal.  An< 
since  we  must  have  it  let  us  thank  God  for  it  and  avail  oui 

176 


Charity 

selves  of  all  its  advantages  to  mind  and  character.  He  who 
is  not  good  to  the  deserving  poor — who  knows  not  those  of  his 
immediate  environment,  who  goes  not  among  them  making 
inquiry  of  their  personal  needs,  who  does  not  wish  with  all  his 
heart  and  both  his  hands  to  relieve  them — is  a  fool. 


177 


Emancipated 
Woman  .  .  . 


Emancipated  Woman 


HAT  I  should  like  to  know  is,  how  "the  enlarge 
ment  of  woman's  sphere"  by  entrance  into  the 
various  activities  of  commercial,  professional  and 
industrial  life  benefits  the  sex.  It  may  please 
Helen  Gougar  and  satisfy  her  sense  of  logical  accuracy  to 
say,  as  she  does:  "We  women  must  work  in  order  to  fill  the 
places  left  vacant  by  liquor-drinking  men."  But  who  filled 
these  places  before?  Did  they  remain  vacant,  or  were  there 
then  disappointed  applicants,  as  now?  If  my  memory  serves, 
there  has  been  no  time  in  the  period  that  it  covers  when  the 
supply  of  workers — abstemious  male  workers — was  not  in  ex 
cess  of  the  demand.  That  it  has  always  been  so  is  sufficiently 
attested  by  the  universally  inadequate  wage  rate. 

Employers  seldom  fail,  and  never  for  long,  to  get  all  the 
workmen  they  need.  The  field,  then,  into  which  women  have 
put  their  sickles  was  already  overcrowded  with  reapers. 
Whatever  employment  women  have  obtained  has  been  got  by 
displacing  men — who  would  otherwise  be  supporting  women. 
Where  is  the  general  advantage?  We  may  shout  "high 
tariff,"  "combination  of  capital,"  "demonetization  of  silver," 
and  what  not,  but  if  searching  for  the  cause  of  augmented 
poverty  and  crime,  "industrial  discontent,"  and  the  tramp  evil, 
instead  of  dogmatically  expounding  it,  we  should  take  some 
account  of  this  enormous,  sudden  addition  to  the  number  of 
workers  seeking  work.  If  any  one  thinks  that  within  the  brief 
period  of  a  generation  the  visible  supply  of  labor  can  be  enor 
mously  augmented  without  profoundly  affecting  the  stability 

181 


The  Shadow  on   the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

of  things  and  disastrously  touching  the  interests  of  wage- 
workers,  let  no  rude  voice  dispel  his  dream  of  such  maleficent 
agencies  as  his  slumbrous  understanding  may  joy  to  affirm. 
And  let  our  Widows  of  Ashur  unlung  themselves  in  advocacy 
of  quack  remedies  for  evils  for  which  they  themselves  are 
cause;  it  remains  true  that  when  the  contention  of  two  lions 
for  one  bone  is  exacerbated  by  the  accession  of  a  lioness  the 
squabble  is  not  composable  by  stirring  up  some  bears  in  the 
cage  adjacent. 

Indubitably  a  woman  is  under  no  obligation  to  sacrifice 
herself  to  the  good  of  her  sex  by  refusing  needed  employment 
in  the  hope  that  it  may  fall  to  a  man  gifted  with  dependent 
women.  Nevertheless  our  congratulations  are  more  intelligent 
when  bestowed  upon  her  individual  head  than  when  sifted  into 
the  hair  of  all  Eve's  daughters.  This  is  a  world  of  complexi 
ties,  in  which  the  lines  of  interest  are  so  intertangled  as  fre 
quently  to  transgress  that  of  sex;  and  one  ambitious  to  help 
but  half  the  race  may  profitably  know  that  every  effort  to  that 
end  provokes  a  counterbalancing  mischief.  The  "enlargement 
of  woman's  opportunities"  has  benefited  individual  women. 
It  has  not  benefited  the  sex  as  a  whole,  and  has  distinctly  dam 
aged  the  race.  The  mind  that  can  not  discern  a  score  of  great 
and  irreparable  general  evils  distinctly  traceable  to  "emanci 
pation  of  woman"  is  as  impregnable  to  the  light  as  a  toad  in  a 
rock. 

A  marked  demerit  of  the  new  order  of  things — the  regime 
of  female  commercial  service — is  that  its  main  advantage 
accrues,  not  to  the  race,  not  to  the  sex,  not  to  the  class,  not  to 
the  individual  woman,  but  to  the  person  of  least  need  and 
worth — the  male  employer.  (Female  employers  in  any  con 
siderable  number  there  will  not  be,  but  those  that  we  have 

182 


Emancipated  Woman 


could  give  the  male  ones  profitable  instruction  in  grinding  the 
faces  of  their  employees.)  This  constant  increase  of  the  army 
of  labor — always  and  everywhere  too  large  for  the  work  in 
sight — by  accession  of  a  new  contingent  of  natural  oppressibles 
makes  the  very  teeth  of  old  Munniglut  thrill  with  a  poignant 
delight.  It  brings  in  that  situation  known  as  two  laborers  seek 
ing  one  job — and  one  of  them  a  person  whose  bones  he  can 
easily  grind  to  make  his  bread.  And  Munniglut  is  a  miller  of 
skill  and  experience,  dusted  all  over  with  the  evidence  of  his 
useful  craft.  When  Heaven  has  assisted  the  Daughters  of 
Hope  to  open  to  women  a  new  "avenue  of  opportunities"  the 
first  to  enter  and  walk  therein,  like  God  in  the  Garden  of 
Eden,  is  the  good  Mr.  Munniglut,  contentedly  smoothing  the 
folds  out  of  the  superior  slope  of  his  paunch,  exuding  the 
peculiar  aroma  of  his  oleaginous  personality,  and  larding  the 
new  roadway  with  the  overflow  of  a  righteousness  secreted  by 
some  spiritual  gland  stimulated  to  action  by  relish  of  his  own 
identity.  And  ever  thereafter  the  subtle  suggestion  of  a  fat 
Philistinism  lingers  along  the  path  of  progress  like  an  assertion 
of  a  possessory  right. 

It  is  God's  own  crystal  truth  that  in  dealing  with  women 
unfortunate  enough  to  be  compelled  to  earn  their  own  living 
and  fortunate  enough  to  have  wrested  from  Fate  an  opportunity 
to  do  so,  men  of  business  and  affairs  treat  them  with  about  the 
same  delicate  consideration  that  they  show  to  dogs  and  horses 
of  the  inferior  breeds.  It  does  not  commonly  occur  to  the 
wealthy  "professional  man,"  or  "prominent  merchant,"  to  be 
ashamed  to  add  to  his  yearly  thousands  a  part  of  the  salary 
justly  due  to  his  female  bookkeeper  or  typewriter,  who  sits 
before  him  all  day  with  an  empty  belly  in  order  to  have  an 
habilimented  back.  He  has  a  vague,  hazy  notion  that  the  law 

183 


The  Shadow   on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

of  supply  and  demand  is  mandatory,  and  that  in  submitting 
himself  to  it  by  paying  her  a  half  of  what  he  would  have  to 
pay  a  man  of  inferior  efficiency  he  is  supplying  the  world  with 
a  noble  example  of  obedience.  I  must  take  the  liberty  to 
remind  him  that  the  law  of  supply  and  demand  is  not  impera 
tive;  it  is  not  a  statute,  but  a  phenomenon.  He  may  reply: 
"It  is  imperative;  the  penalty  for  disobedience  is  failure.  If 
I  pay  more  in  salaries  and  wages  than  I  need  to,  my  competitor 
will  not;  and  with  that  advantage  he  will  drive  me  from  the 
field."  If  his  margin  of  profit  is  so  small  that  he  must  eke  it 
out  by  coining  the  sweat  of  his  workmen  into  nickels,  I've 
nothing  to  say  to  him.  Let  him  adopt  in  peace  the  motto,  "I 
cheat  to  eat."  I  do  not  know  why  he  should  eat,  but  Nature, 
who  has  provided  sustenance  for  the  worming  sparrow,  the 
sparrowing  owl,  and  the  owling  eagle,  approves  the  needy  man 
of  prey,  and  makes  a  place  for  him  at  table. 

Human  nature  is  pretty  well  balanced;  for  every  lacking 
virtue  there  is  a  rough  substitute  that  will  serve  at  a  pinch — as 
cunning  is  the  wisdom  of  the  unwise,  and  ferocity  the  courage 
of  the  coward.  Nobody  is  altogether  bad;  the  scoundrel 
who  has  grown  rich  by  underpaying  the  workmen  in  his  factory 
will  sometimes  endow  an  asylum  for  indigent  seamen.  To 
oppress  one's  own  workmen,  and  provide  for  the  workmen  of 
a  neighbor — to  skin  those  in  charge  of  one's  own  interests, 
while  cottoning  and  oiling  the  residuary  product  of  another's 
skinnery — that  is  not  very  good  benevolence,  nor  very  good 
sense,  but  it  serves  in  place  of  both.  The  man  who  eats  pate 
de  fois  gras  in  the  sweat  of  his  girl  cashier's  face,  or  wears 
purple  and  fine  linen  in  order  that  his  typewriter  may  have  an 
eocene  gown  and  a  pliocene  hat,  seems  a  tolerably  satisfactory 
specimen  of  the  genus  thief;  but  let  us  not  forget  that  in  his 

184 


Emancipated  Woman 


own  home — a  fairly  good  one — he  may  enjoy  and  merit  that 
highest  and  most  honorable  title  in  the  hierarchy  of  woman's 
favor,  **a  good  provider."  One  having  a  just  claim  to  that 
glittering  distinction  should  enjoy  a  sacred  immunity  from  the 
coarse  and  troublesome  question,  "From  whose  backs  and 
bellies  do  you  provide?" 

So  much  for  the  material  results  to  the  sex.  What  are  the 
moral  results?  One  does  not  like  to  speak  of  them,  particu 
larly  to  those  who  do  not  and  can  not  know — to  good  women 
in  whose  innocent  minds  female  immorality  is  inseparable  from 
flashy  gowning  and  the  painted  face;  to  foolish,  book-taught 
men  who  honestly  believe  in  some  protective  sanctity  that 
hedges  womanhood.  If  men  of  the  world  with  years  enough 
to  have  lived  out  of  the  old  regime  into  the  new  would  testify 
in  this  matter  there  would  ensue  a  great  rattling  of  dry  bones 
in  bodices  of  reform  ladies.  Nay,  if  the  young  man  about 
town,  knowing  nothing  of  how  things  were  in  the  "dark  back 
ward  and  abysm  of  time,"  but  something  of  the  moral  difference 
between  even  so  free-running  a  creature  as  the  society  girl  and 
the  average  working  girl  of  the  factory,  the  shop  and  the  office, 
would  speak  out  (under  assurance  of  immunity  from  prosecu 
tion)  his  testimony  would  be  a  surprise  to  the  cartilaginous 
virgins,  blowsy  matrons,  acrid  relicts  and  hairy  males  of  Eman 
cipation.  It  would  pain,  too,  some  very  worthy  but  unobservant 
persons  not  in  sympathy  with  "the  cause." 

Certain  significant  facts  are  within  the  purview  of  all  but 
the  very  young  and  the  comfortably  blind.  To  the  woman  of 
today  the  man  of  today  is  imperfectly  polite.  In  place  of  rev 
erence  he  gives  her  "deference;"  to  the  language  of  compli 
ment  has  succeeded  the  language  of  raillery.  Men  have  almost 
forgotten  how  to  bow.  Doubtless  the  advanced  female  prefers 

185 


The  Shadow   on   the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

the  new  manner,  as  may  some  of  her  less  forward  sisters,  think 
ing  it  more  sincere.  It  is  not;  our  giddy  grandfather  talked 
high-flown  nonsense  because  his  heart  had  tangled  his  tongue. 
He  treated  his  woman  more  civilly  than  we  ours  because 
he  loved  her  better.  He  never  had  seen  her  on  the  "rostrum" 
and  in  the  lobby,  never  had  seen  her  in  advocacy  of  herself, 
never  had  read  her  confessions  of  his  sins,  never  had  felt  the 
stress  of  her  competition,  nor  himself  assisted  by  daily  personal 
contact  in  rubbing  the  bloom  off  her.  He  did  not  know  that 
her  virtues  were  due  to  her  secluded  life,  but  thought,  dear  old 
boy,  that  they  were  a  gift  of  God. 


186 


The  Opposing  Sex 


The  Opposing  Sex 


MANCIPATION  of  woman  is  not  of  American 
invention.  The  "movement,"  like  most  others 
that  are  truly  momentous,  originated  in  Europe, 
and  has  broken  through  and  broken  down  more 
formidable  barriers  of  law,  custom  and  tradition  there  than 
here.  It  is  not  true  that  the  English  married  woman  is  "vir 
tually  a  bondwoman*'  to  her  husband;  that  "she  can  hardly 
go  and  come  without  his  consent,  and  usually  he  does  not  con 
sent;"  that  "all  she  has  is  his."  If  there  is  such  a  thing  as  "the 
bitterness  of  the  English  married  woman  to  the  law,"  under 
lying  it  there  is  such  a  thing  as  ignorance  of  what  the  law  is. 
The  "subjection  of  woman,"  as  it  exists  today  in  England,  is 
customary  and  traditionary — a  social,  not  a  legal,  subjection. 
Nowhere  has  law  so  sharply  challenged  that  male  dominion 
whose  seat  is  in  the  harder  muscles,  the  larger  brain  and  the 
coarser  heart.  And  the  law,  it  may  be  worth  while  to  point 
out,  was  not  of  woman  born;  nor  was  it  handed  down  out  of 
Heaven  engraved  on  tables  of  stone.  Learned  English  judges 
have  decided  that  virtually  the  term  "marital  rights"  has  no 
longer  a  legal  signification.  As  one  writer  puts  it,  "The  law  has 
relaxed  the  husband's  control  over  his  wife's  person  and  for 
tune,  bit  by  bit,  until  legally  it  has  left  him  nothing  but  the 
power  to  prevent  her,  if  he  is  so  disposed,  and  arrives  in  time, 
from  jumping  out  of  the  window."  He  will  find  it  greatly  to 
his  interest  to  arrive  in  time  when  he  conveniently  can,  and  to 
be  so  disposed,  for  the  husband  is  still  liable  for  the  wife's  torts ; 

189 


The  Shadow  on  the. Dial  and  other  Essays 

and  if  she  makes  the  leap  he  may  have  to  pay  for  the  telescop 
ing  of  a  subjacent  hat  or  two. 

In  England  it  is  the  Tyrant  Man  himself  who  is  chafing 
in  his  chain.  Not  only  is  a  husband  still  liable  for  the  wrongs 
committed  by  the  wife  whom  he  has  no  longer  the  power  to 
restrain  from  committing  them,  but  in  many  ways — in  one  very 
important  way — his  obligation  to  her  remains  intact  after  she 
has  had  the  self-sacrifice  to  surrender  all  obligation  to  him. 
Moreover,  if  his  wife  has  a  separate  estate  he  has  to  endure  the 
pain  of  seeing  it  hedged  about  from  her  creditors  (themselves 
not  altogether  happy  in  the  contemplation)  with  restrictions 
which  do  not  hamper  the  right  of  recourse  against  his  own. 
Doubtless  all  this  is  not  without  a  softening  effect  upon  his  char 
acter,  smoothing  down  his  dispositional  asperities  and  endow 
ing  him  day  by  day  with  fresh  accretions  of  humility.  And 
that  is  good  for  him.  I  do  not  say  that  female  autonomy  is  not 
among  the  most  efficacious  agencies  for  man's  reclamation  from 
the  sin  of  pride;  I  only  say  that  it  is  not  indigenous  to  this 
country,  the  sweet,  sweet  home  of  the  assassiness,  the  happy 
hunting  ground  of  the  whiplady,  the  paradise  of  the  vitrioleuse. 

If  the  protagonists  of  woman  suffrage  are  frank  they  are 
shallow;  if  wise,  uncandid.  Continually  they  affirm  their 
conviction  that  political  power  in  the  hands  of  women  will 
give  us  better  government.  To  proof  of  that  proposition  they 
address  all  the  powers  that  they  have  and  marshal  such  facts 
as  can  be  compelled  to  serve  under  their  flag.  They  either 
think  or  profess  to  think  that  if  they  can  show  that  women's 
votes  will  purify  politics  they  will  have  proved  their  case. 
That  is  not  true;  whether  they  know  it  or  not,  the  strongest 
objection  to  woman  suffrage  would  remain  untouched.  Pure 
politics  is  desirable,  certainly,  but  it  is  not  the  chief  concern  of 

190 


The  Opposing  Sex 


the  best  and  most  intelligent  citizens.  Good  government  is 
"devoutly  to  be  wished,"  but  more  than  good  government  we 
need  good  women.  If  all  our  public  affairs  were  to  be  ordered 
with  the  goodness  and  wisdom  of  angels,  and  this  state  of  per 
fection  were  obtained  by  sacrifice  of  any  of  those  qualities 
which  make  the  best  of  our  women,  if  not  what  they  should  be, 
nor  what  the  mindless  male  thinks  them,  at  least  what  they  are, 
we  should  have  purchased  the  advantage  too  dearly.  The 
effect  of  woman  suffrage  upon  the  country  is  of  secondary  im 
portance:  the  question  for  profitable  consideration  is,  How 
will  it  affect  the  character  of  woman?  He  who  does  not  see 
in  the  goodness  and  charm  of  such  women  as  are  good  and 
charming  something  incalculably  more  precious  than  any  de 
gree  of  political  purity  or  national  prosperity  may  be  a  patriot : 
doubtless  he  is;  but  also  he  has  the  distinction  to  be  a  pig. 

I  should  like  to  ask  the  gallant  gentlemen  who  vote  for 
removal  of  woman's  political  disability  if  they  have  observed 
in  the  minds  and  manners  of  the  women  in  the  forefront  of 
the  movement  nothing  "ominous  and  drear."  Are  not  these 
women  different — I  don't  say  worse,  just  different — from  the 
best  types  of  women  of  peace  who  are  not  exhibits  and  audi- 
bles?  If  they  are  different,  is  the  difference  of  such  a  nature 
as  to  encourage  a  hope  that  activity  in  public  affairs  will  work 
an  improvement  in  women  generally?  Is  "the  glare  of  pub 
licity"  good  for  her  growth  in  grace  and  winsomeness?  Would 
a  sane  and  sensible  husband  or  lover  willingly  forego  in  wife  or 
sweetheart  all  that  the  colonels  of  her  sex  appear  to  lack,  or 
find  in  her  all  that  they  appear  to  have  and  to  value? 

A  few  more  questions — addressed  more  particularly  to 
veteran  observers  than  to  those  to  whom  the  world  is  new  and 
strange.  Have  you  observed  any  alteration  in  the  manner  of 

191 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

men  toward  women?  If  so,  is  it  in  the  direction  of  greater 
rudeness  or  of  more  ceremonious  respect?  And  again,  if  so, 
has  not  the  change,  in  point  of  time,  been  coincident  with  the 
genesis  and  development  of  woman's  "emancipation"  and  her 
triumphal  entry  into  the  field  of  "affairs"?  Are  you  really 
desirous  that  the  change  go  further?  Or  do  you  think  that 
when  women  are  armed  with  the  ballot  they  will  compel  a  re 
turn  of  the  old  regime  of  deference  and  delicate  consideration 
— extorting  by  their  power  the  tribute  once  voluntarily  paid 
to  their  weakness?  Is  there  any  known  way  by  which  women 
can  at  once  be  our  political  equals  and  our  social  superiors,  our 
competitors  in  the  sharp  and  bitter  struggle  for  glory,  gain  or 
bread,  and  the  objects  of  our  unselfish  and  undiminished  devo 
tion?  The  present  predicts  the  future;  of  the  foreshadow  of 
the  coming  event  all  sensitive  female  hearts  feel  the  chill. 
For  whatever  advantages,  real  or  illusory,  some  women  enjoy 
under  this  regime  of  partial  "emancipation"  all  women  pay. 
Of  the  coin  in  which  payment  is  made  the  shouldering  shouters 
of  the  sex  have  not  a  groat  and  can  bear  the  situation  with 
impunity.  They  have  either  passed  the  age  of  masculine 
attention  or  were  born  without  the  means  to  its  accroachment. 
Dwelling  in  the  open  bog,  they  can  afford  to  defy  eviction. 

While  men  did  nearly  all  the  writing  and  public  speak 
ing  of  the  world,  setting  so  the  fashion  in  thought,  women, 
naturally  extolled  with  true  sexual  extravagance,  came  to  be 
considered,  even  by  themselves,  as  a  very  superior  order  of 
beings,  with  something  in  them  of  divinity  which  was  denied 
to  man.  Not  only  were  they  represented  as  better,  generally, 
than  men,  as  indeed  anybody  could  see  that  they  were,  but 
their  goodness  was  supposed  to  be  a  kind  of  spiritual  endow 
ment  and  more  or  less  independent  of  environmental  influences. 

192 


The  Opposing  Sex 


We  are  changing  all  that.  Women  are  beginning  to  do  much 
of  the  writing  and  public  speaking,  and  not  only  are  they  going 
to  extol  us  (to  the  fattening  of  our  conceit)  but  they  are  bound 
to  disclose,  even  to  the  unthinking,  certain  defects  of  character 
in  themselves  which  their  silence  had  veiled.  Their  competi 
tion,  too,  in  several  kinds  of  affairs  will  slowly  but  certainly 
provoke  resentment,  and  moreover  expose  them  to  temptations 
which  will  distinctly  lower  the  morality  of  their  sex.  All  these 
changes,  and  many  more  having  a  similar  effect  and  signifi 
cance,  are  occurring  with  amazing  rapidity,  and  the  stated 
results  are  already  visible  to  even  the  blindest  observation.  In 
accurate  depiction  of  the  new  order  of  things  conjecture  fails, 
but  so  much  we  know:  the  woman-superstition  has  already 
received  its  death  wound  and  must  soon  expire. 

Everywhere,  and  in  no  reverential  spirit,  men  are  question 
ing  the  dear  old  idolatry;  not  "sapping  a  solemn  creed  with 
solemn  sneer,"  but  dispassionately  applying  to  its  basic  doc 
trine  the  methods  of  scientific  criticism.  He  who  within  even 
the  last  twenty  years  has  not  marked  in  society,  in  letters,  in 
art,  in  everything,  a  distinct  change  in  man's  attitude  toward 
women — a  change  which,  were  one  a  woman,  one  would  not 
wish  to  see — may  reasonably  conclude  that  much,  otherwise 
observable,  is  hidden  by  his  nose.  In  the  various  movements — 
none  of  them  consciously  iconoclastic — engaged  in  overthrow 
ing  this  oddest  of  modern  superstitions  there  is  something  to 
deprecate,  and  even  deplore,  but  the  superstition  can  be  spared. 
It  never  had  much  in  it  that  was  either  creditable  or  profitable, 
and  all  through  its  rituals  ran  a  note  of  insincerity  which  was 
partly  Nature's  protest  against  the  rites,  but  partly,  too,  hypoc 
risy.  There  is  no  danger  that  good  men  will  ever  cease  to 
respect  and  love  good  women,  and  if  bad  men  ever  cease  to 

193 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

adore  them  for  their  sex  when  not  beating  them  for  their  vir 
tues  the  gain  in  consistency  will  partly  offset  the  loss  in  religious 
ecstasy. 

Let  the  patriot  abandon  his  fear,  his  betters  their  hope,  that 
only  the  low  class  woman  will  vote — the  unlettered  wench  of 
the  slums,  the  raddled  hag  of  the  dives,  the  war-painted  protegee 
of  the  police.  Into  the  vortex  of  politics  goes  every  floating 
thing  that  is  free  to  move.  The  summons  to  the  polls  will  be 
imperative  and  incessant.  Duty  will  thunder  it  from  every 
platform,  conscience  whisper  it  into  every  ear,  pride,  interest, 
the  lust  of  victory — all  the  motives  that  impel  men  to  partisan 
activity  will  act  with  equal  power  upon  women  as  upon  men; 
and  to  all  the  other  forces  flowing  irresistibly  toward  the  polls 
will  be  added  the  suasion  of  men  themselves.  The  price  of 
votes  will  not  decline  because  of  the  increased  supply,  although 
it  will  in  most  instances  be  offered  in  currencies  too  subtle  to 
be  counted.  As  now,  the  honest  and  respectable  elector  will 
habitually  take  bribes  in  the  invisible  coin  of  the  realm  of  Senti 
ment — a  mintage  peculiarly  valued  by  woman.  For  one  rea 
son  or  another  all  women  will  vote,  even  those  who  now  view 
the  "right"  with  aversion.  The  observer  who  has  marked  the 
strength  and  activity  of  the  forces  pent  in  the  dark  drink  of 
politics  and  given  off  in  the  act  of  bibation  will  not  expect  in 
action  to  the  victim  of  the  "habit,"  be  he  male  or  she  female. 
In  the  partisan,  conviction  is  compulsion — opinions  bear  fruit 
in  conduct.  The  partisan  thinks  in  deeds,  and  woman  is  by 
nature  a  partisan — a  blessing  for  which  the  Lord  has  never 
made  her  male  relatives  and  friends  sufficiently  thankful.  Not 
a  mere  man  of  them  would  have  the  effrontery  to  ask  her  tol 
eration  if  she  were  not.  Depend  upon  it,  the  full  strength  of 
the  female  vote  will  eventually  be  cast  at  every  election.  And 

194 


The  Opposing  Sex 


it  would  be  well  indeed  for  civilization  and  the  interests  of  the 
race  if  woman  suffrage  meant  no  more  than  going  to  the 
polling-place  and  polling — which  clearly  is  all  that  it  has  been 
thought  out  to  mean  by  the  headless  horsemen  spurring  their 
new  hobbies  bravely  at  the  tail  of  the  procession.  That  would 
be  a  very  simple  matter;  the  opposition  based  upon  the  impro 
priety  of  the  female  rubbing  shoulders  at  the  polls  with  such 
scurvy  blackguards  as  ourselves  may  with  advantage  be  retired 
from  service.  Nor  is  it  particularly  important  what  men  and 
measures  the  women  will  vote  for.  By  one  means  or  another 
Tyrant  Man  will  have  his  way ;  the  Opposing  Sex  can  merely 
obstruct  him  in  his  way  of  having  it.  And  should  that  obstruc 
tion  ever  be  too  pronounced,  the  party  line  and  the  sex  line 
coinciding,  woman  suffrage  will  then  and  thenceforth  be  no 
more. 

In  the  politics  of  this  bad  world  majorities  are  of  several 
kinds.  One  of  the  most  "overwhelming"  is  made  up  of  these 
simple  elements:  (1)  a  numerical  minority;  (2)  a  military 
superiority.  If  not  a  single  election  were  ever  in  any  degree 
affected  by  it,  the  introduction  of  woman  suffrage  into  our 
scheme  of  manners  and  morals  would  nevertheless  be  the  most 
momentous  and  mischievous  event  of  modern  history.  Com 
pared  with  the  action  of  this  destructive  solvent,  that  of  all 
other  disintegrating  agencies  concerned  in  our  decivilization  is 
as  the  languorous  indiligence  of  rosewater  to  the  mordant  fury 
of  nitric  acid. 

Lively  Woman  is  indeed,  as  Carlyle  would  put  it,  "hell 
bent**  on  purification  of  politics  by  adding  herself  as  an  in 
gredient.  It  is  unlikely  that  the  injection  of  her  personality 
into  the  contention  (and  politics  is  essentially  a  contention) 
will  allay  any  animosities,  sweeten  any  tempers,  elevate  any 

195 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

motives.  The  strifes  of  women  are  distinctly  meaner  than 
those  of  men — which  are  out  of  all  reason  mean ;  their  methods 
of  overcoming  opponents  distinctly  more  unscrupulous.  That 
their  participation  in  politics  will  notably  alter  the  conditions 
of  the  game  is  not  to  be  denied;  that,  unfortunately,  is  ob 
vious;  but  that  it  will  make  the  player  less  malignant  and  the 
playing  more  honorable  is  a  proposition  in  support  of  which 
one  can  utter  a  deal  of  gorgeous  nonsense,  with  a  less  insup 
portable  sense  of  its  unfitness,  than  in  the  service  of  any  other 
delusion. 

The  frosty  truth  is  that  except  in  the  home  the  influence  of 
women  is  not  elevating,  but  debasing.  When  they  stoop  to 
uplift  men  who  need  uplifting,  they  are  themselves  pulled 
down,  and  that  is  all  that  is  accomplished.  Wherever  they 
come  into  familiar  contact  with  men  who  are  not  their  relatives 
they  impart  nothing,  they  receive  all;  they  do  not  affect  us 
with  their  notions  of  morality;  we  infect  them  with  ours.  In 
the  last  forty  years,  in  this  country,  they  have  entered  a  hun 
dred  avenues  of  activity  from  which  they  were  previously 
debarred  by  an  unwritten  law.  They  are  found  in  the  offices, 
the  shops,  the  factories.  Like  Charles  Lamb's  fugitive  pigs, 
they  have  run  up  all  manner  of  streets.  Does  any  one  think 
that  in  that  time  there  has  been  an  advance  in  professional, 
commercial  and  industrial  morality?  Are  lawyers  more  scru 
pulous,  tradesmen  more  honest?  When  one  has  been  served 
by  a  "saleslady"  does  one  leave  the  shop  with  a  feebler  sense 
of  injury  than  was  formerly  inspired  by  a  transaction  at  the 
counter — a  duller  consciousness  of  being  oneself  the  commod 
ity  that  has  changed  hands?  Have  actresses  elevated  the  stage 
to  a  moral  altitude  congenial  to  the  colder  virtues?  In  studios 
of  the  artists  is  the  "sound  of  revelry  by  night"  invariably  a 

196 


The  Opposing  Sex 


deep,  masculine  bass?  In  literature  are  the  immoral  books — 
the  books  "dealing"  with  questionable  "questions" — always, 
or  even  commonly,  written  by  men? 

There  is  one  direction  in  which  "emancipation  of  woman" 
and  enlargement  of  her  "sphere"  have  wrought  a  reform:  they 
have  elevated  the  personnel  of  the  little  dinner  party  in  the 
"private  room."  Formerly,  as  any  veteran  man-about- town 
can  testify,  if  he  will,  the  female  contingent  of  the  party  was 
composed  of  persons  altogether  unspeakable.  That  element 
now  remains  upon  its  reservation;  among  the  superior  advan 
tages  enjoyed  by  the  man-about-town  of  today  is  that  of  the 
companionship,  at  his  dinner  in  camera,  of  ladies  having  an 
honorable  vocation.  In  the  corridors  of  the  "French  restau 
rant"  the  swish  of  Pseudonyma's  skirt  is  no  longer  heard;  she 
has  been  superseded  by  the  Princess  Tap- tap  (with  Truckle 
&  Cinch),  by  my  lady  Snip-snip  (from  the  "emporium"  of 
Boltwhack  &  Co.),  by  Miss  Chink-chink,  who  sits  at  the  re 
ceipt  of  customs  in  that  severely  un-French  restaurant,  the 
Maison  Hash.  That  the  man-about-town  has  been  morally 
elevated  by  this  Emancipation  of  Girl  from  the  seclusion  of 
home  to  that  of  the  "private  room"  is  too  obvious  for  denial. 
Nothing  so  uplifts  Tyrant  Man  as  the  table  talk  of  good  young 
women  who  earn  their  own  living. 

I  do  not  wish  to  be  altogether  ironical  about  this  rather 
serious  matter — not  so  much  so  as  to  forfeit  anything  of  lucidity. 
Let  me  state,  then,  in  all  earnestness  and  sobriety  and  sim 
plicity  of  speech,  what  is  known  to  every  worldly-wise  male 
dweller  in  the  cities,  to  every  scamp  and  scapegrace  of  the 
clubs,  to  every  reformed  sentimentalist  and  every  observer  with 
a  straight  eye — namely,  that  in  all  the  various  classes  of  young 
women  in  our  cities  who  support,  or  partly  support,  themselves 

197 


The  Shadow   on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

in  vocations  which  bring  them  into  personal  contact  with  men, 
female  chastity  is  a  vanishing  tradition.  In  the  lives  of  the 
"main  and  general*'  of  these,  all  those  considerata  which  have 
their  origin  in  personal  purity,  and  cluster  about  it,  and  are  its 
signs  and  safeguards,  have  almost  ceased  to  cut  a  figure.  It  is 
needless  to  remind  me  that  there  are  exceptions — I  know  that. 
With  some  of  them  I  have  personal  acquaintance,  or  think  I 
have,  and  for  them  a  respect  withheld  from  any  woman  of  the 
rostrum  who  points  to  their  misfortune  and  calls  it  emancipa 
tion — to  their  need  and  calls  it  a  spirit  of  independence.  It 
is  not  from  these  good  girls  that  you  will  hear  the  flippant 
boast  of  an  unfettered  life,  with  "freedom  to  develop;"  nor  is 
it  they  who  will  be  foremost  and  furious  in  denial  and  resent 
ment  of  my  statements  regarding  the  morals  of  their  class. 
They  do  not  know  the  whole  truth,  thank  Heaven,  but  they 
know  enough  for  a  deprecation  too  deep  to  find  relief  in  a 
cheap  affirmation  of  woman's  purity,  which  is,  and  always  has 
been,  the  creature  of  seclusion. 

The  fitness  of  women  for  political  activity  is  not  in  present 
question;  I  am  considering  the  fitness  of  political  activity  for 
women.  For  women  as  men  say  they  are,  wish  them  to  be, 
and  try  to  think  them,  it  is  unfit  altogether — as  unfit  as  any 
thing  else  that  "mixes  them  up"  with  us,  compelling  a  com 
munication  and  association  that  are  not  social.  If  we  wish  to 
have  women  who  are  different  from  ourselves  in  knowledge, 
character,  accomplishments,  manners;  as  different  mentally  as 
physically — and  in  these  and  in  all  other  expressible  differences 
reside  all  the  charms  that  they  have  for  us — we  must  keep 
them,  or  they  must  keep  themselves,  in  an  environment  unlike 
our  own.  One  would  think  that  obvious  to  the  meanest  ca 
pacity,  and  might  even  hope  that  it  would  be  understood  by 

198 


The  Opposing  Sex 


the  Daughters  of  Thunder.  Possibly  the  Advanced  One,  hos 
pitably  accepting  her  karma,  is  not  concerned  to  be  charming 
to  "the  likes  o'  we" — would  prefer  the  companionship  of  her 
blue  gingham  umbrella,  her  corkscrew  curls,  her  epicene  audi 
ences  and  her  name  in  the  newspapers.  Perhaps  she  is  con 
tent  with  the  comfort  of  her  raucous  voice.  Therein  she  is 
unwise,  for  self-interest  is  the  first  law.  When  we  no  longer 
find  woman  charming  we  may  find  a  way  to  make  them  more 
useful — more  truly  useful,  even,  than  the  speech-ladies  would 
have  them  make  themselves  by  competition.  Really,  there  is 
nothing  in  the  world  between  them  and  slavery  but  their  power 
of  interesting  us;  and  that  has  its  origin  in  the  very  differences 
which  the  Colonels  are  striving  to  abolish.  God  has  made  no 
law  of  miracles  and  none  of  His  laws  are  going  to  be  sus 
pended  in  deference  to  woman's  desire  to  achieve  familiarity 
without  contempt.  If  she  wants  to  please  she  must  retain 
some  scrap  of  novelty;  if  she  desires  our  respect  she  must 
not  be  always  in  evidence,  disclosing  the  baser  side  of  her  char 
acter,  as  in  competition  with  us  she  must  do  (as  we  do  to  one 
another)  or  lamentably  fail.  Mrs.  Edmund  Gosse,  like 
"Ouida,"  Mrs.  Atherton,  and  all  other  women  of  brains,  de 
clares  that  the  taking  of  unfair  advantages — the  lack  of  mag 
nanimity — is  a  leading  characteristic  of  her  sex.  Mrs.  Gosse 
adds,  with  reference  to  men's  passive  acquiescence  in 
this  monstrous  folly  of  "emancipation,"  that  possibly  our  quiet 
may  be  the  calm  before  the  storm ;  and  she  utters  this  warning, 
which,  also,  more  strongly,  "Ouida"  has  uttered:  "How 
would  it  be  with  us  if  the  men  should  suddenly  rise  en  masse 
and  throw  the  whole  surging  lot  of  us  into  convents  and 
harems  >" 

199 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

It  is  not  likely  that  men  will  "rise  en  masse*'  to  undo  the 
mischief  wrought  by  noisy  protagonists  of  Woman  Suffrage 
working  like  beavers  to  rear  their  airy  fad  upon  the  sandy  foun 
dation  of  masculine  tolerance  and  inattention.  No  rising  will 
be  needed.  All  that  is  required  for  the  wreck  of  their  hopes 
is  for  a  wave  of  reason  to  slide  a  little  farther  up  the  sands  of 
time,  "loll  out  its  large  tongue,  lick  the  whole  labor  flat." 
The  work  has  prospered  so  far  only  because  nobody  but  its 
promoters  has  taken  it  seriously.  It  has  not  engaged  attention 
from  those  having  the  knowledge  and  the  insight  to  discern 
beneath  its  cap-and-bells  and  the  motley  that  is  its  only  wear 
a  serious  menace  to  all  that  civilized  men  hold  precious  in 
woman.  It  is  of  the  nature  of  men — themselves  cheerful  po- 
lygamists,  with  no  penitent  intentions — to  set  a  high  value  upon 
chastity  in  woman.  (We  need  not  inquire  why  they  do  so; 
those  to  whom  the  reasons  are  not  clear  can  profitably  remain 
in  the  valley  of  the  shadow  of  ignorance.)  Valuing  it,  they 
purpose  having  it,  or  some  considerable  numerical  presumption 
of  it.  As  they  perceive  that  in  a  general  way  women  are  virtu 
ous  in  proportion  to  the  remoteness  of  their  lives  and  interests 
from  the  lives  and  interests  of  men — their  seclusion  from  the 
influences  of  which  men's  own  vices  are  a  main  part — an  easy 
and  peaceful  means  will  doubtless  be  found  for  the  repression 
of  the  shouters. 

In  the  orchestration  of  mind  woman's  instruments  might 
have  kept  silence  without  injury  to  the  volume  and  quality  of 
the  music;  efface  the  impress  of  her  touch  upon  the  world 
and,  by  those  who  come  after,  the  blank  must  be  diligently 
sought.  Go  to  the  top  of  any  large  city  and  look  about  and 
below.  It  is  not  much  that  you  will  see,  but  it  represents  an 
amazing  advance  from  the  conditions  of  primitive  man.  No- 

200 


The  Opposing  Sex 


where  in  the  wide  survey  will  you  see  the  work  of  woman.  It 
is  all  the  work  of  men's  hands,  and  before  it  was  wrought  into 
form  and  substance,  existed  as  conscious  creations  in  men's 
brains.  Concealed  within  the  visible  forms  of  buildings  and 
ships — themselves  miracles  of  thought — lie  such  wonder- 
worlds  of  invention  and  discovery  as  no  human  life  is  long 
enough  to  explore,  no  human  understanding  capacious  enough 
to  hold  in  knowledge.  If,  like  Asmodeus,  we  could  rive  the 
roofs  and  see  woman's  part  of  this  prodigious  exhibition — the 
things  that  she  has  actually  created  with  her  brain — what  kind 
of  display  would  it  be?  It  is  probable  that  all  the  intellectual 
energy  expended  by  women  from  first  to  last  would  not  have 
sufficed,  if  directed  into  the  one  channel,  for  the  genesis  and 
evolution  of  the  modern  bicycle. 

I  once  heard  a  lady  who  had  playfully  competed  with 
men  in  a  jumping  match  gravely  attribute  her  defeat  to  the 
trammeling  of  her  skirt.  Similarly,  women  are  pleased  to  ex 
plain  their  penury  of  mental  achievement  by  repressive  educa 
tion  and  custom,  and  therein  they  are  not  altogether  in  heresy. 
But  even  in  regions  where  they  have  ever  had  the  freedom  of 
the  quarries  they  have  not  builded  themselves  monuments.  No 
body,  for  example,  is  holding  them  from  greatness  in  poetry, 
which  needs  no  special  education,  and  music,  in  which  they 
have  always  been  specially  educated;  yet  where  is  the  great 
poem  by  a  woman?  where  the  great  musical  composition? 
In  the  grammar  of  literature  what  is  the  feminine  of  Homer, 
of  Shakspere,  of  Goethe,  of  Hugo?  What  female  names 
are  the  equivalents  of  the  names  of  Beethoven,  Mozart,  Cho 
pin,  Wagner?  Women  are  not  musicians — they  "sing  and 
play."  In  short,  if  woman  had  no  better  claim  to  respect  and 
affection  than  her  brain;  no  sweeter  charms  than  those  of  her 

201 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

reason;  no  means  of  suasion  but  her  power  upon  men's  con 
victions,  she  would  long  ago  have  been  "improved  off  the  face 
of  the  earth."  As  she  is,  men  accord  her  such  homage  as  is 
compatible  with  contempt,  such  immunities  as  are  consistent 
with  exaction;  but  whereas  she  is  not  altogether  filled  with 
light,  and  is,  moreover,  imperfectly  reverent,  it  is  but  right  that 
in  obedience  to  Scriptural  injunction  she  keep  silence  in  our 
churches  while  we  are  worshipping  Ourselves. 

She  will  not  have  it  so,  the  good,  good  girl;  as  moral  as 
the  best  of  us,  she  will  be  as  intellectual  as  the  rest  of  us.  She 
will  have  out  her  little  taper  and  set  the  rivers  of  thought  all 
ablaze,  legging  it  over  the  land  from  stream  to  stream  till  all 
are  fired.  She  will  widen  her  sphere,  forsooth,  herself  no  wider 
than  before.  It  is  not  enough  that  we  have  edified  her  a  ped 
estal  and  perform  impossible  rites  in  celebration  of  her  altitude 
and  distinction.  It  does  not  suffice  that  with  never  a  smile  we 
assure  her  that  she  is  the  superior  sex — a  whopper  by  the  repe 
tition  whereof  certain  callow  youth  among  us  have  incurred 
the  divine  vengeance  of  belief.  It  does  not  satisfy  her  that  she 
is  indubitably  gifted  with  pulchritude  and  an  unquestionable 
genius  for  its  embellishing;  that  Nature  has  endowed  her  with 
a  prodigious  knack  at  accroachment,  whereby  the  male  of  her 
species  is  lured  to  a  suitable  doom.  No ;  she  has  taken  unto  her 
self  in  these  evil  days  that  "intelligent  discontent'*  which  giveth 
its  beloved  fits.  To  her  flock  of  graces  and  virtues  she  must  add 
our  one  poor  ewe  lamb  of  brains.  Well,  I  tell  her  that  intellect 
is  a  monster  which  devours  beauty ;  that  the  woman  of  excep 
tional  mind  is  exceptionally  masculine  in  face,  figure,  action; 
that  in  transplanting  brains  to  an  unfamiliar  soil  God  leaves 
much  of  the  original  earth  about  the  roots.  And  so  with  a 
reluctant  farewell  to  Lovely  Woman,  I  humbly  withdraw  from 

202 


The  Opposing  Sex 


her  presence  and  hasten  to  overtake  the  receding  periphery  of 
her  "sphere." 

One  moment  more,  Mesdames :  I  crave  leave  to  estop  your 
disfavor — which  were  affliction  and  calamity — by  "defining  my 
position"  in  the  words  of  one  of  yourselves,  who  has  said  of  me 
(though  with  reprehensible  exaggeration,  believe  me)  that  I 
hate  woman  and  love  women — have  an  acute  animosity  to  your 
sex  and  adoring  each  individual  member  of  it.  What  matters 
my  opinion  of  your  understandings  so  long  as  I  am  in  bondage 
to  your  charms?  Moreover,  there  is  one  service  of  incompar 
able  utility  and  dignity  for  which  I  esteem  you  eminently  fit — 
to  be  mothers  of  men. 


203 


The  American 
Sycophant 


The  American  Sycophant 


N  AMERICAN  newspaper  holds  this  opinion : 

"If  republican  government  had  done  nothing 
else  than  give  independence  to  American  charac 
ter  and  preserve  it  from  the  servility  inseparable 
from  the  allegiance  to  kings,  it  would  have  accomplished  a  great 
work." 

I  do  not  doubt  that  the  writer  of  that  sentence  believes 
that  republican  government  has  actually  wrought  the  change  in 
human  nature  which  challenges  his  admiration.  He  is  very 
sure  that  his  countrymen  are  not  sycophants;  that  before  rank 
and  power  and  wealth  they  stand  covered,  maintaining  "the 
godlike  attitude  of  freedom  and  a  man"  and  exulting  in  it.  It 
is  not  true;  it  is  an  immeasurable  distance  from  the  truth. 
We  are  as  abject  toadies  as  any  people  on  earth — more  so 
than  any  European  people  of  similar  civilization.  When  a  for 
eign  emperor,  king,  prince  or  nobleman  comes  among  us  the 
rites  of  servility  that  we  execute  in  his  honor  are  baser  than  any 
that  he  ever  saw  in  his  own  land.  When  a  foreign  nobleman's 
prow  puts  into  shore  the  American  shin  is  pickled  in  brine  to 
welcome  him ;  and  if  he  come  not  in  adequate  quantity  those  of 
us  who  can  afford  the  expense  go  swarming  over  sea  to  struggle 
for  front  places  in  his  attention.  In  this  blind  and  brutal  scramble 
for  social  recognition  in  Europe  the  traveling  American  toady 
and  impostor  has  many  chances  of  success:  he  is  commonly 
unknown  even  to  ministers  and  consuls  of  his  own  country,  and 
these  complaisant  gentlemen,  rather  than  incur  the  risk  of  erring 

207 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

on  the  wrong  side,  take  him  at  his  own  valuation  and  push  him 
in  where  his  obscurity  being  again  in  his  favor,  he  is  treated  with 
kindly  toleration,  and  sometimes  a  genuine  hospitality,  to  which 
he  has  no  shadow  of  right  nor  title,  and  which,  if  he  were  a 
gentleman,  he  would  not  accept  if  it  were  voluntarily  proffered. 
It  should  be  said  in  mitigation  that  all  this  delirious  abasement 
in  no  degree  tempers  his  rancor  against  the  system  of  which 
the  foreign  notable  is  the  flower  and  fruit.  He  keeps  his  servil 
ity  sweet  by  preserving  it  in  the  salt  of  vilification.  In  the  char 
acter  of  a  blatant  blackguard  the  American  snob  is  so  happily 
disguised  that  he  does  not  know  himself. 

An  American  newspaper  once  printed  a  portrait  of  her 
whom  the  irreverent  Briton  had  a  reprehensible  habit  of  desig 
nating  colloquially  as  "The  Old  Lady."  But  the  editor  in 
question  did  not  so  designate  her — his  simple  American  man 
hood  and  republican  spirit  would  not  admit  that  she  was  a  lady. 
So  he  contented  himself  with  labeling  the  portrait  "Her  Most 
Gracious  Majesty,  Queen  Victoria."  This  incident  raises  an 
important  question. 

Important  Question  Raised  by  This  Incident:  Is  it  better 
to  be  a  subject  and  a  man,  or  a  citizen  and  a  flunkey? — to 
own  the  sway  of  a  "gory  tyrant"  and  retain  one's  self-respect, 
or  dwell,  a  "sovereign  elector,"  in  the  land  of  liberty  and 
disgrace  it? 

However  it  may  be  customary  for  English  newspapers  to 
designate  the  English  sovereign,  they  are  at  least  not  addicted 
to  sycophancy  in  designating  the  rulers  of  other  countries  than 
their  own.  They  would  not  say  "His  Abracadabral  Humpti- 
dumptiness  Emperor  William,"  nor  "His  Pestilency  the 
Speaker  of  the  American  House  of  Representatives."  They 
would  not  think  of  calling  even  the  most  ornately  self-bemed- 

208 


The  American  Sycophant 


aled  American  sovereign  elector  "His  Badgesty.  "Of  a  foreign 
nobleman  they  do  not  say  "His  Lordship;"  they  will  not 
admit  that  he  is  a  lord ;  nor  when  speaking  of  their  own  noble 
men  do  they  spell  "lord"  with  a  capital  L,  as  we  do.  In  brief, 
when  mentioning  foreign  dignitaries,  of  whatever  rank  in  their 
own  countries,  the  English  press  is  simply  and  serviceably  de 
scriptive:  the  king  is  a  king,  the  queen  a  queen,  the  jack  a 
jack.  We  use  "another  kind  of  common  sense."  At  the  very 
foundation  of  our  political  system  lies  the  denial  of  hereditary 
and  artificial  rank.  Our  fathers  created  this  government  as  a 
protest  against  all  that,  and  all  that  it  implies.  They  virtually 
declared  that  kings  and  noblemen  could  not  breathe  here,  and 
no  American  loyal  to  the  principles  of  the  Revolution  which 
made  him  one  will  ever  say  in  his  own  country  "Your  Maj 
esty"  or  "Your  Lordship" — the  words  would  choke  him  and 
they  ought. 

There  are  a  few  of  us  who  keep  the  faith,  who  do  not  bow 
the  knee  to  Baal,  who  hold  fast  to  what  is  high  and  good  in 
the  doctrine  of  political  equality;  in  whose  hearts  the  altar- 
fires  of  rational  liberty  are  kept  aglow,  beaconing  the  darkness 
of  that  illimitable  inane  where  their  countrymen,  inaccessible 
to  the  light,  wander  witless  in  the  bogs  of  political  unreason, 
alternately  adoring  and  damning  the  man-made  gods  of  their 
own  stature.  Of  that  bright  band  fueling  the  bale-fires  of  po 
litical  consistency  I  can  not  profess  myself  a  member  in  good 
standing.  In  view  of  this  general  recreancy  and  treason  to  the 
principles  that  our  fathers  established  by  the  sword — having 
in  constant  observation  this  almost  universal  hospitality  to  the 
solemn  nonsense  of  hereditary  rank  and  unearned  distinction, 
my  faith  in  practical  realization  of  republican  ideals  is  small, 
and  I  falter  in  the  work  of  their  maintenance  in  the  interest  of 

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The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

a  people  for  whom  they  are  too  good.  Seeing  that  we  are 
immune  to  none  of  the  evils  besetting  monarchies,  excepting 
those  for  which  we  secretly  yearn;  that  inequality  of  fortune 
and  unjust  allotment  of  honors  are  as  conspicuous  among  us  as 
elsewhere ;  that  the  tyranny  of  individuals  is  as  intolerable,  and 
that  of  the  public  more  so;  that  the  law's  majesty  is  a  dream 
and  its  failure  a  fact — hearing  everywhere  the  footfalls  of  dis 
order  and  the  watchwords  of  anarchy,  I  despair  of  the  repub 
lic,  and  catch  in  every  breeze  that  blows  "a  cry  prophetic  of  its 
fall." 

I  have  seen  a  vast  crowd  of  Americans  change  color  like  a 
field  of  waving  grain,  as  it  uncovered  to  do  such  base  homage  to 
a  petty  foreign  princess  as  in  her  own  country  she  had  never  re 
ceived.  I  have  seen  full-grown,  self-respecting  American 
citizens  tremble  and  go  speechless  when  spoken  to  by  the  Em 
peror  of  Brazil.  I  have  seen  a  half-dozen  American  gentlemen 
in  evening  clothes  trying  to  outdo  one  another  in  the  profundity 
of  their  bows  in  the  presence  of  the  nigger  King  of  Hawaii.  I 
have  not  seen  a  Chinese  "Earl"  borne  in  a  chair  by  four  Amer 
icans  officially  detailed  for  the  disgraceful  service,  but  it  was 
done,  and  did  not  evoke  a  hiss  of  disapproval.  And  I  did  not 
— thank  Heaven! — observe  the  mob  of  American  "simple  re 
publicans"  that  dogged  the  heels  of  a  disreputable  little 
Frenchman  who  is  a  count  by  courtesy  only,  and  those  of  an 
English  duke  quietly  attending  to  his  business  of  making  a 
living  by  being  a  married  man.  The  republican  New  World 
is  no  less  impested  with  servility  than  the  monarchial  Old.  One 
form  of  government  may  be  better  than  another  for  this  pur 
pose  or  for  that;  all  are  alike  in  the  futility  of  their  influence 
upon  human  character.  None  can  affect  man's  instinctive 
abasement  in  the  contemplation  of  power  and  rank. 

210 


The  American  Sycophant 


Not  only  are  we  no  less  sycophantic  than  the  people  of 
monarchial  countries;  we  are  more  so.  We  grovel  before 
their  exalted  personages,  and  perform  in  addition  a  special 
prostration  at  the  clay  feet  of  our  own  idols — which  they  do 
not  revere.  The  typical  "subject,"  hat-in-hand  to  his  sovereign 
and  his  nobleman,  is  a  less  shameful  figure  than  the  "citizen" 
executing  his  genuflexion  before  the  public  of  which  he  is  him 
self  a  part.  No  European  court  journal,  no  European  courtier, 
was  ever  more  abject  in  subservience  to  the  sovereign  than  are 
the  American  newspaper  and  the  American  politician  in  flat 
tery  of  the  people.  Between  the  courtier  and  the  demagogue 
I  see  nothing  to  choose.  They  are  moved  by  the  same  sentiment 
and  fired  by  the  same  hope.  Their  method  is  flattery,  and  their 
purpose  profit.  Their  adulation  is  not  a  testimony  to  character, 
but  a  tribute  to  power,  or  the  shadow  of  power.  If  this  country 
were  governed  by  its  criminal  idiots  we  should  have  the  same 
attestations  of  their  goodness  and  wisdom,  the  same  competi 
tion  for  their  favor,  the  same  solemn  doctrine  that  their  voice 
is  the  voice  of  God.  Our  children  would  be  brought  up  to 
believe  that  an  Idiotocracy  is  the  only  natural  and  rational  form 
of  government.  And  for  my  part  I'm  not  at  all  sure  that  it 
would  not  be  a  pretty  good  political  system,  as  political  systems 
go.  I  have  always,  however,  cherished  a  secret  faith  in  Smith- 
ocracy,  which  seems  to  combine  the  advantages  of  both  the 
monarchial  and  the  republican  idea.  If  all  the  offices  were  held 
for  life  by  Smiths — the  senior  John  being  President — we 
should  have  a  settled  and  orderly  succession  to  allay  all  fears 
of  anarchy  and  a  sufficiently  wide  eligibility  to  feed  the  fires  of 
patriotic  ambition.  All  could  not  be  Smiths,  but  many  could 
marry  into  the  family. 

The  Harrison  "progress"  left  its  heritage  of  shame,  whereof 

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The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

each  abaser  would  gladly  have  washed  the  hands  of  him  in  his 
neighbor's  basin.  All  this  was  in  due  order  of  Nature,  and 
was  to  have  been  expected.  It  was  a  phenomenon  of  the  same 
character  as,  in  the  loves  of  the  low,  the  squabbling  conse 
quent  upon  satiety  and  shame.  We  could  not  slink  out  of 
sight;  we  could  deny  our  sycophancy,  albeit  we  might  give  it 
another  name;  but  we  could  somewhat  medicine  our  damaged 
self-esteem  by  dealing  damnation  'round  on  one  another.  The 
blush  of  shame  turned  easily  to  the  glow  of  indignation,  and 
many  a  hot  hatred  was  kindled  at  the  rosy  flame  of  self- 
contempt.  Persons  conscious  of  having  dishonored  themselves 
are  doubly  sensitive  to  any  indignity  put  upon  them  by  others. 
The  vices  and  follies  of  human  nature  are  interdependent; 
they  do  not  move  alone,  nor  are  they  singly  aroused  to  activity. 
In  my  judgment,  this  entire  incident  of  the  President's 
"tour"  was  infinitely  discreditable  to  President  and  people.  I 
do  not  go  into  the  question  of  his  motive  in  making  it.  Be  that 
what  it  may,  the  manner  of  it  seems  to  me  an  outrage  upon  all 
the  principles  and  sentiments  underlying  republican  institutions. 
In  all  but  the  name  it  was  a  "royal  progress" — the  same  costly 
ostentation,  the  same  civic  and  military  pomp,  the  same  solemn 
and  senseless  adulation,  the  same  abasement  of  spirit  of  the 
Many  before  the  One.  And  according  to  republican  tradi 
tions,  ten  thousand  times  a  year  affirmed,  in  every  way  in 
which  affirmation  is  possible,  we  fondly  persuade  ourselves,  as 
a  true  faith  in  the  hearts  of  our  hearts,  that  the  One  is  the 
inferior  of  the  Many!  And  it  is  no  mere  political  catch-phrase: 
he  is  their  servant ;  he  is  their  creature ;  all  that  in  him  to  which 
they  grovel  (dignifying  and  justifying  their  instinctive  and  in 
herited  servility  by  names  as  false  as  anything  in  ceremonial 
imposture)  they  themselves  have  made,  as  truly  as  the  heathen 

212 


The  American  Sycophant 


has  made  the  wooden  god  before  which  he  performs  his 
unmanly  rite.  It  is  precisely  this  thing — the  superiority  of  the 
people  to  their  servants — that  constitutes,  and  was  by  our  fathers 
understood  to  constitute,  the  essential,  fundamental  differ 
ence  between  the  monarchial  system  which  they  uprooted  and 
the  democratic  one  which  they  planted  in  its  stead.  Deluded 
men !  how  little  they  guessed  the  length  and  strength  and  vital 
ity  of  the  roots  left  in  the  soil  of  the  centuries  when  their  noxious 
harvestage  of  mischievous  institutions  had  been  cast  as  rubbish 
to  the  void! 

I  am  no  contestant  for  forms  of  government — no  believer 
in  either  the  practical  value  or  the  permanence  of  any  that  has 
yet  been  devised.  That  all  men  are  created  equal,  in  the  best 
and  highest  sense  of  the  phrase,  I  hold ;  not  as  I  observe  it  held 
by  others,  but  as  a  living  faith.  That  an  officeholder  is  a  serv 
ant  of  the  people;  that  I  am  his  political  superior,  owing  him 
no  deference,  and  entitled  to  such  deference  from  him  as  may 
be  serviceable  to  keep  him  in  mind  of  his  subordination — these 
are  propositions  which  command  my  assent,  which  I  feel  to  be 
true  and  which  determine  the  character  of  my  personal  relations 
with  those  whom  they  concern.  That  I  should  give  my  hand, 
or  bend  my  neck,  or  uncover  my  head  to  any  man  in  homage  to 
or  recognition  of  his  office,  great  or  small,  is  to  me  simply  incon 
ceivable.  These  tricks  of  servility  with  the  softened  names  are 
the  vestiges  of  an  involuntary  allegiance  to  power  extraneous  to 
the  performer.  They  represent  in  our  American  life  obedience 
and  propitiation  in  their  most  primitive  and  odious  forms.  The 
man  who  speaks  of  them  as  manifestations  of  a  proper  respect 
for  "the  President's  great  office"  is  either  a  rogue,  a  dupe  or  a 
journalist.  They  come  to  us  out  of  a  fascinating  but  terrible 
past  as  survivals  of  servitude.  They  speak  a  various  language 

213 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

of  oppression,  and  the  superstition  of  man-worship;  they  carry 
forward  the  traditions  of  the  sceptre  and  the  lash.  Through 
the  plaudits  of  the  people  may  be  heard  always  the  faint,  far 
cry  of  the  beaten  slave. 

Respect?  Respect  the  good.  Respect  the  wise.  Respect 
the  dead.  Let  the  President  look  to  it  that  he  belongs  to  one 
of  these  classes.  His  going  about  the  country  in  gorgeous  state 
and  barbaric  splendor  as  the  guest  of  a  thieving  corporation, 
but  at  our  expense — shining  and  dining  and  swining — unsoul- 
ing  himself  of  clotted  nonsense  in  pickled  platitudes  calculated 
for  the  meridian  of  Coon  Hollow,  Indiana,  but  ingeniously 
adapted  to  each  water  tank  on  the  line  of  his  absurd  "pro 
gress,"  does  not  prove  it,  and  the  presumption  of  his  "great 
office"  is  against  him. 

Can  you  not  see,  poor  misguided  "fellow  citizens,"  how 
you  permit  your  political  taskmasters  to  forge  leg-chains  of 
your  follies  and  load  you  down  with  them?  Will  nothing 
teach  you  that  all  this  fuss-and-feathers,  all  this  ceremony,  all 
this  official  gorgeousness  and  brass-banding,  this  "manifestation 
of  a  proper  respect  for  the  nation's  head"  has  no  decent  place 
in  American  life  and  American  politics?  Will  no  experience 
open  your  stupid  eyes  to  the  fact  that  these  shows  are  but 
absurd  imitations  of  royalty,  to  hold  you  silly  while  you  are 
plundered  by  the  managers  of  the  performance? — that  while 
you  toss  your  greasy  caps  in  air  and  sustain  them  by  the  ascend 
ing  current  of  your  senseless  hurrahs  the  programmers  are  going 
through  your  blessed  pockets  and  exploiting  your  holy  dollars? 
No;  you  feel  secure;  "power  is  of  the  People,"  and  you  can 
effect  a  change  of  robbers  every  four  years.  Inestimable  priv 
ilege — to  pull  off  the  glutted  leech  and  attach  the  lean  one! 
And  you  can  not  even  choose  among  the  lean  leeches,  but  must 

214 


The  American  Sycophant 


accept  those  designated  by  the  programmers  and  showmen  who 
have  the  reptiles  on  tap!  But  then  you  are  not  "subjects;" 
you  are  "citizens" — there  is  much  in  that.  Your  tyrant  is  not 
a  "King;"  he  is  a  "President."  He  does  not  occupy  a 
"throne,"  but  a  "chair."  He  does  not  succeed  to  it  by  inherit 
ance;  he  is  pitchforked  into  it  by  the  boss.  Altogether,  you 
are  distinctly  better  off  than  the  Russian  mujik  who  wears  his 
shirt  outside  his  trousers  and  has  never  shaken  hands  with  the 
Czar  in  all  his  life. 

I  hold  that  kings  and  noblemen  can  not  breathe  in  America. 
When  they  set  foot  upon  our  soil  their  kingship  and  their  no 
bility  fall  away  from  them  like  the  chains  of  a  slave  in  Eng 
land.  Whatever  a  man  may  be  in  his  own  country,  here  he  is 
but  a  man.  My  countrymen  may  do  as  they  please,  lickspittling 
the  high  and  mighty  of  other  nations  even  to  the  filling  of  their 
spiritual  bellies,  but  I  make  a  stand  for  simple  American  man 
hood.  I  will  meet  no  man  on  this  soil  who  expects  from  me  a 
greater  deference  than  I  could  properly  accord  to  the  President 
of  my  own  country.  My  allegiance  to  republican  institutions 
is  slack  through  lack  of  faith  in  them  as  a  practical  system  of 
governing  men  as  men  are.  All  the  same,  I  will  call  no  man 
"Your  Majesty,"  nor  "Your  Lordship."  For  me  to  meet  in 
my  own  country  a  king  or  a  nobleman  would  require  as  much 
preliminary  negotiation  as  an  official  interview  between  the 
Mufti  of  Moosh  and  the  Ahkoond  of  Swat.  The  form  of  sal 
utation  and  the  style  and  title  of  address  would  have  to  be 
settled  definitively  and  with  precision.  With  some  of  my  most 
esteemed  and  patriotic  friends  the  matter  is  more  simple;  their 
generosity  in  concession  fills  me  with  admiration  and  their  for 
bearance  in  exaction  challenges  my  astonishment  as  one  of  the 
seven  wonders  of  American  hospitality.  In  fancy  I  see  the 

215 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

ceremony  of  their  "presentation"  and  as  examples  of  simple 
republican  dignity  I  commend  their  posture  to  the  youth  of  this 
fair  New  World,  inviting  particular  attention  to  the  grand, 
bold  curves  of  character  shown  in  the  outlines  of  the  Human 
Ham. 


216 


A  Dissertation 
on   Dogs  .... 


A  Dissertation  on  Dogs 


F  ALL  anachronisms  and  survivals,  the  love  of  the 
dog,  is  the  most  reasonless.  Because,  some  thousands 
of  years  ago,  when  we  wore  other  skins  than  our 
own  and  sat  enthroned  upon  our  haunches,  tear 
ing  tangles  of  tendons  from  raw  bones  with  our  teeth,  the  dog 
ministered  purveyorwise  to  our  savage  needs,  we  go  on  cherish 
ing  him  to  this  day,  when  his  only  function  is  to  lie  sun-soaken 
on  a  door  mat  and  insult  us  as  we  pass  in  and  out,  enamored  of 
his  fat  superfluity.  One  dog  in  a  thousand  earns  his  bread — and 
takes  beefsteak;  the  other  nine  hundred  and  ninety-nine  we 
maintain,  by  cheating  the  poor,  in  the  style  suitable  to  their 
state. 

The  trouble  with  the  modern  dog  is  that  he  is  the  same  old 
dog.  Not  an  inch  has  the  rascal  advanced  along  the  line  of 
evolution.  We  have  ceased  to  squat  upon  our  naked  haunches 
and  gnaw  raw  bones,  but  this  companion  of  the  childhood  of 
the  race,  this  vestigial  remnant  of  juventus  mundi,  this  dismal 
anachronism,  this  veteran  inharmony  of  the  scheme  of  things, 
the  dog,  has  abated  no  jot  nor  tittle  of  his  unthinkable  objection- 
ableness  since  the  morning  stars  sang  together  and  he  had  sat 
up  all  night  to  deflate  a  lung  at  the  performance.  Possibly  he 
may  some  time  be  improved  otherwise  than  by  effacement,  but 
at  present  he  is  still  in  that  early  stage  of  reform  that  is  not  in 
compatible  with  a  mouthful  of  reformer. 

The  dog  is  a  detestable  quadruped.  He  knows  more  ways 
to  be  unmentionable  than  can  be  suppressed  in  seven  languages. 

219 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

The  word  "dog"  is  a  term  of  contempt  the  world  over.  Poets 
have  sung  and  prosaists  have  prosed  of  the  virtues  of  individual 
dogs,  but  nobody  has  had  the  hardihood  to  eulogize  the  species. 
No  man  loves  the  Dog;  he  loves  his  own  dog  or  dogs,  and 
there  he  stops;  the  force  of  perverted  affection  can  no  further 
go.  He  loves  his  own  dog  partly  because  that  thrifty  creature, 
ever  cadging  when  not  maurauding,  tickles  his  vanity  by  fawn 
ing  upon  him  as  the  visible  source  of  steaks  and  bones;  and 
partly  because  the  graceless  beast  insults  everybody  else,  harm 
ing  as  many  as  he  dares.  The  dog  is  an  encampment  of  fleas, 
and  a  reservoir  of  sinful  smells.  He  is  prone  to  bad  manners 
as  the  sparks  fly  upward.  He  has  no  discrimination;  his  loy 
alty  is  given  to  the  person  that  feeds  him,  be  the  same  a  black 
guard  or  a  murderer's  mother.  He  fights  for  his  master  without 
regard  to  the  justice  of  the  quarrel — wherein  he  is  no  better 
than  a  patriot  or  a  paid  soldier.  There  are  men  who  are  proud 
of  a  dog's  love — and  dogs  love  that  kind  of  men.  There  are 
men  who,  having  the  privilege  of  loving  women,  insult  them  by 
loving  dogs;  and  there  are  women  who  forgive  and  respect 
their  canine  rivals.  Women,  I  am  told,  are  true  cynolaters; 
they  adore  not  only  dogs,  but  Dog — not  only  their  own  horrible 
little  beasts,  but  those  of  others.  But  women  will  love  any 
thing  ;  they  love  men  who  love  dogs.  I  sometimes  wonder  how 
it  is  that  of  all  our  women  among  whom  the  dog  fad  is  prev 
alent  none  have  incurred  the  husband  fad,  or  the  child  fad. 
Possibly  there  are  exceptions,  but  it  seems  to  be  a  rule  that 
the  female  heart  which  has  a  dog  in  it  is  without  other  lodgers. 
There  is  not,  I  suppose,  a  very  wild  and  importunate  demand 
for  accommodation.  For  my  part,  I  do  not  know  which  is 
the  less  desirable,  the  tenant  or  the  tenement.  There  are  dogs 
that  submit  to  be  kissed  by  women  base  enough  to  kiss  them; 

220 


A  Dissertation  on  Dogs 


but  they  have  a  secret,  coarse  revenge.  For  the  dog  is  a  joker, 
withal,  gifted  with  as  much  humor  as  is  consistent  with  biting. 

Miss  Louise  Imogen  Guiney  has  replied  to  Mrs.  Meynell's 
proposal  to  abolish  the  dog — a  proposal  which  Miss  Guiney 
has  the  originality  to  call  "original."  Divested  of  its  "litera 
ture,"  Miss  Guiney 's  plea  for  the  defendant  consists,  essen 
tially,  of  the  following  assertions :  ( 1 )  Dogs  are  whatever 
their  masters  are.  (2)  They  bite  only  those  who  fear  them. 
(3)  Really  vicious  dogs  are  not  found  nearer  than  Constan 
tinople.  (4)  Only  wronged  dogs  go  mad,  and  hydrophobia 
is  retaliation.  (5)  In  actions  for  damages  for  dog-bites  judi 
cial  prejudice  is  against  the  dog.  (6)  "Dogs  are  continually 
saving  children  from  death."  (7)  Association  with  dogs  be 
gets  piety,  tenderness,  mercy,  loyalty,  and  so  forth;  in  brief, 
the  dog  is  an  elevating  influence:  "to  walk  modestly  at  a  dog's 
heels  is  a  certificate  of  merit!"  As  to  that  last,  if  Miss  Guiney 
had  ever  observed  the  dog  himself  walking  modestly  at  the 
heels  of  another  dog  she  would  perhaps  have  wished  that  it 
was  not  the  custom  of  her  sex  to  seal  the  certificate  of  merit  with 
a  kiss. 

In  all  this  absurd  woman's  statements,  thus  fairly  epito- 
imized,  there  is  not  one  that  is  true — not  one  of  which  the  essen- 
itial  falsity  is  not  evident,  obvious,  conspicuous  to  even  the  most 
'delinquent  observation.  Yet  with  the  smartness  and  smirk  of  a 
i graduating  seminary  girl  refuting  Epicurus  she  marshals  them 
.  against  the  awful  truth  that  every  year  in  Europe  and  the 
United  States  alone  more  than  five  thousand  human  beings  die 
of  hydrophobia — a  fact  which  her  controversial  conscience  does 
not  permit  her  to  mention.  The  names  on  this  needless  death- 
roll  are  mostly  those  of  children,  the  sins  of  whose  parents  in 
cherishing  their  own  hereditary  love  of  dogs  is  visited  upon  their 

221 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

children  because  they  have  not  the  intelligence  and  agility  to 
get  out  of  the  way.  Or  perhaps  they  lack  that  tranquil  courage 
upon  which  Miss  Guiney  relies  to  avert  the  canine  tooth  from 
her  own  inedible  shank. 

Finally  this  amusing  illogician,  this  type  and  example  of 
the  female  controversialist,  has  the  hardihood  to  hope  that  there 
may  be  fathers  who  can  see  their  children  die  the  horrible  death 
of  hydrophobia  without  wishing  "to  exile  man's  best  ideal  of 
fidelity  from  the  hearthstones  of  civilization."  If  we  must  have 
an  "ideal  of  fidelity"  why  not  find  it,  not  in  the  dog  that  kills 
the  child,  but  in  the  father  that  kills  the  dog.  The  profit  of 
maintaining  a  standard  and  pattern  of  the  virtues  (at  consid 
erable  expense  in  the  case  of  this  insatiable  canine  consumer) 
may  be  great,  but  are  we  so  hard  pushed  that  we  must  go  to  the 
animals  for  it?  In  life  and  letters  are  there  no  men  and  women 
whose  names  kindle  enthusiasm  and  emulation?  Is  fidelity,  is 
devotion,  is  self-sacrifice  unknown  among  ourselves?  As  a 
model  of  the  higher  virtues  why  will  not  one's  mother  serve  at 
a  pinch?  And  what  is  the  matter  with  Miss  Guiney  herself? 
She  is  faithful,  at  least  to  dogs,  whatever  she  may  be  to  the 
hundreds  of  American  children  inevitably  foredoomed  to  a 
death  of  unthinkable  agony. 

There  is  perhaps  a  hope  that  when  the  sun's  returning  flame 
shall  gild  the  hither  end  of  the  thirtieth  century  this  savage  and 
filthy  brute,  the  dog,  will  have  ceased  to  "banquet  on  through 
a  whole  year"  of  human  fat  and  lean ;  that  he  will  have  been 
gathered  to  his  variously  unworthy  fathers  to  give  an  account 
of  the  deeds  done  in  body  of  man.  In  the  meantime,  those 
of  us  who  have  not  the  enlightened  understanding  to  be  enam 
ored  of  him  may  endure  with  such  fortitude  as  we  can  com 
mand  his  feats  of  tooth  among  the  shins  and  throats  of  those 

222 


A  Dissertation  on  Dogs 


who  have;  we  ourselves  are  so  few  that  there  is  a  strong 
numerical  presumption  of  personal  immunity. 

It  is  well  to  have  a  clear  understanding  of  such  inconveni 
ences  as  may  be  expected  to  ensue  from  dog-bites.  That  incon 
veniences  and  even  discomforts  do  sometimes  flow  from,  or  at 
least  follow,  the  mischance  of  being  bitten  by  dogs,  even  the 
sturdiest  champion  of  "man's  best  friend"  will  admit  when  not 
heated  by  controversy.  True,  he  is  indisposed  to  sympathy 
for  those  incurring  the  inconveniences  and  discomforts,  but 
against  apparent  incompassion  may  be  offset  his  indubitable 
sympathy  with  the  dog.  No  one  is  altogether  heartless. 

Amongst  the  several  disadvantages  of  a  close  personal  con 
nection  with  the  canine  tooth,  the  disorder  known  as  hydropho 
bia  has  long  held  an  undisputed  primacy.  The  existence  of  this 
ailment  is  attested  by  so  many  witnesses,  many  of  whom,  be 
longing  to  the  profession  of  medicine,  speak  with  a  certain  au 
thority,  that  even  the  breeders  and  lovers  of  snap-dogs  are 
compelled  reluctantly  to  concede  it,  though  as  a  rule  they 
stoutly  deny  that  it  is  imparted  by  the  dog.  In  their  view,  hy 
drophobia  is  a  theory,  not  a  condition.  The  patient  imagines 
himself  to  have  it,  and  acting  upon  that  unsupported  assumption 
or  hypothesis,  suffers  and  dies  in  the  attempt  to  square  his  con 
duct  with  his  opinions. 

It  seems  there  is  firmer  ground  for  their  view  of  the  matter 
than  the  rest  of  us  have  been  willing  to  admit.  There  is  such 
a  thing,  doubtless,  as  hydrophobia  proper,  but  also  there  is  such 
another  thing  as  pseudo-hydrophobia,  or  hydrophobia  im 
proper. 

Pseudo-hydrophobia,  the  physicians  explain,  is  caused  by 
fear  of  hydrophobia.  The  patient,  having  been  chewed  by  a 
healthy  and  harmless  dog,  broods  upon  his  imaginary  peril, 

223 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

solicitously  watches  his  imaginary  symptoms,  and,  finally,  per 
suading  himself  of  their  reality,  puts  them  on  exhibition,  as  he 
understands  them.  He  runs  about  (when  permitted)  on  his 
hands  and  knees,  growls,  barks,  howls,  and  in  default  of  a  tail 
wags  the  part  of  him  where  it  would  be  if  he  had  one.  In  a 
few  days  he  is  gone  before,  a  victim  to  his  lack  of  confidence 
in  man's  best  friend. 

The  number  of  cases  of  pseudo-hydrophobia,  relatively, 
to  those  of  true  hydrophobia,  is  not  definitely  known,  the  medi 
cal  records  having  been  imperfectly  made,  and  never  collated; 
champions  of  the  snap-dog,  as  intimated,  believe  it  is  many  to 
nothing.  That  being  so  (they  argue),  the  animal  is  entirely 
exonerated,  and  leaves  the  discussion  without  a  stain  upon  his 
reputation. 

But  that  is  feeble  reasoning.  Even  if  we  grant  their  prem 
ises  we  can  not  embrace  their  conclusion.  In  the  first  place,  it 
hurts  to  be  bitten  by  a  dog,  as  the  dog  himself  audibly  confesses 
when  bitten  by  another  dog.  Furthermore,  pseudo-hydrophobia 
is  quite  as  fatal  as  if  it  were  a  legitimate  product  of  the  bite, 
not  a  result  of  the  terror  which  that  mischance  inspires. 

Human  nature  being  what  it  is,  and  well  known  to  the  dog 
to  be  what  it  is,  we  have  a  right  to  expect  that  the  creature  will 
take  our  weaknesses  into  consideration — that  he  will  respect  our 
addiction  to  reasonless  panic,  even  as  we  respect  his  when,  as 
we  commonly  do,  we  refrain  from  attaching  tinware  to  his  tail. 
A  dog  that  runs  himself  to  death  to  evade  a  kitchen  utensil 
which  could  not  possibly  harm  him,  and  which  if  he  did  not  flee 
would  not  pursue,  is  the  author  of  his  own  undoing  in  precisely 
the  same  sense  as  is  the  victim  of  pseudo-hydrophobia.  He  is 
slain  by  a  theory,  not  a  condition.  Yet  the  wicked  boy  that  set 
him  going  is  not  blameless,  and  no  one  would  be  so  zealous  and 

224 


A  Dissertation  on  Dogs 


strenuous  in  his  prosecution  as  the  cynolater,  the  adorer  of  dogs, 
the  person  who  holds  them  guiltless  of  pseudo-hydrophobia. 

Mr.  Nicholas  Smith,  while  United  States  Consul  at  Liege, 
wrote,  or  caused  to  be  written,  an  official  report,  wickedly,  will 
fully  and  maliciously  designed  to  abridge  the  privileges,  aug 
ment  the  ills  and  impair  the  honorable  status  of  the  domestic 
dog.  In  the  very  beginning  of  this  report  Mr.  Smith  manifests 
his  animus  by  stigmatizing  the  domestic  dog  as  an  "hereditary 
loafer;"  and  having  hurled  the  allegation,  affirms  "the  dawn 
of  a  [Belgian]  new  era"  wherein  the  pampered  menial  will  loaf 
no  more.  There  is  to  be  no  more  sun-soaking  on  door  mats 
having  a  southern  exposure,  no  more  usurpation  of  the  warmest 
segment  of  the  family  circle,  no  more  successful  personal  solici 
tation  of  cheer  at  the  domestic  board.  The  dog's  place  in  the 
social  scale  is  no  longer  to  be  determined  by  consideration  of 
sentiment,  but  will  be  the  result  of  cold  commercial  calculation, 
and  so  fixed  as  best  to  serve  the  ends  of  industrial  expediency. 
All  this  in  Belgium,  where  the  dog  is  already  in  active  service 
as  a  beast  of  burden  and  draught;  doubtless  the  transition  to 
that  humble  condition  from  his  present  and  immemorial  social 
elevation  in  less  advanced  countries  will  be  slow  and  character 
ized  by  bitter  factional  strife.  America,  especially,  though 
ever  accessible  to  the  infection  of  new  and  profitable  ideas,  will 
be  singularly  slow  to  accept  so  radical  a  subversion  of  a  social 
superstructure  that  almost  may  be  said  to  rest  upon  the  domestic 
dog  as  a  basic  verity. 

The  dogs  are  our  only  true  "leisure  class"  (for  even  the 
tramps  are  sometimes  compelled  to  engage  in  such  simple  indus 
tries  as  are  possible  within  the  "precincts"  of  the  county  jail) 
and  we  are  justly  proud  of  them.  They  toil  not,  neither  spin, 
yet  Solomon  in  all  his  glory  was  not  a  dog.  Instead  of  making 

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The  Shadow  on   the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

them  hewers  of  wood  and  drawers  of  water,  it  would  be  more 
consonant  with  the  Anglomaniacal  and  general  Old  World 
spirit,  now  so  dominant  in  the  councils  of  the  nation,  to  make 
them  "hereditary  legislators."  And  Mr.  Smith  must  permit  me 
to  add,  with  a  special  significance,  that  history  records  an  in 
stance  of  even  a  horse  making  a  fairly  good  Consul. 

Mr.  Smith  avers  with  obvious  and  impudent  satisfaction 
that  in  Liege  twice  as  many  draught  dogs  as  horses  are  seen 
in  the  streets,  attached  to  vehicles.  He  regards  "a  gaily  painted 
cart"  drawn  by  "a  well  fed  dog"  and  driven  by  a  well  fed 
(and  gaily  painted)  woman  as  a  "pleasing  vision."  I  do  not; 
I  should  prefer  to  see  the  dog  sitting  at  the  receipt  of  steaks  and 
chops  and  the  lady  devoting  herself  to  the  amelioration  of  the 
condition  of  the  universe,  and  the  manufacture  of  poetry  and 
stories  that  are  not  true.  A  more  pleasing  vision,  too,  one  en 
deared  to  eye  and  heart  by  immemorial  use  and  wont,  is  that  of 
stranger  and  dog  indulging  in  the  pleasures  of  the  chase — 
stranger  a  little  ahead — while  the  woman  in  the  case  manifests 
a  characteristically  compassionate  solicitude  lest  the  gentleman's 
trousers  do  not  match  Fido's  mustache.  It  is,  indeed,  impossible 
to  regard  with  any  degree  of  approval  the  degradation  to  com 
mercial  utility  of  two  so  noble  animals  as  Dog  and  Woman; 
and  if  Man  had  joined  them  together  by  driving-reins  I  should 
hope  that  God  would  put  them  asunder,  even*  if  the  reins  were 
held  by  Dog.  There  would  no  doubt  be  a  distinct  gain  as 
well  as  a  certain  artistic  fitness  in  unyoking  the  strong-minded 
female  of  our  species  from  the  Chariot  of  Progress  and  yoking 
her  to  the  apple-cart  or  fish-wagon,  and — but  that  is  another 
story;  the  imminence  of  the  draughtwoman  is  not  fore 
shadowed  in  the  report  of  our  Consul  at  Liege. 

Mr.  Smith's  estimate  of  the  number  of  dogs  in  this  country 

226 


A  Dissertation  on  Dogs 


at  7,000,000  is  a  "conservative"  one,  it  must  be  confessed,  and 
can  hardly  have  been  based  on  observations  by  moonlight  in  a 
suburban  village;  his  estimate  of  the  effective  strength  of  the 
average  dog  at  500  pounds  is  probably  about  right,  as  will  be 
attested  by  any  intelligent  boy  who  in  campaigns  against 
orchards  has  experienced  detention  by  the  Cerberi  of  the  places. 
Taking  his  own  figures  Mr.  Smith  calculates  that  we  have  in 
this  country  3,500,000,000  pounds  of  "idle  dog  power."  But 
this  statement  is  more  ingenious  than  ingenuous;  it  gives,  as 
doubtless  it  was  intended  to  give,  the  impression  that  we  have 
only  idle  dogs,  whereas  of  all  mundane  forces  the  domestic  dog 
is  most  easily  stirred  to  action.  His  expense  of  energy  in  pur 
suit  of  the  harmless,  necessary  flea,  for  example,  is  prodigious; 
and  he  is  not  infrequently  seen  in  chase  of  his  own  tail,  with  an 
activity  scarcely  inferior.  If  there  is  anything  worth  while  in  ac 
cepted  theories  of  the  conversion  and  conservation  of  force  these 
gigantic  energies  are  by  no  means  wasted ;  they  appear  as  heat, 
light  and  electricty,  modifying  climate,  reducing  gas  bills  and 
assisting  in  propulsion  of  street  cars.  Even  in  baying  the  moon 
and  insulting  visitors  and  bypassers  the  dog  releases  a  certain 
amount  of  vibratory  force  which  through  various  mutations  of 
its  wave-length,  may  do  its  part  in  cooking  a  steak  or  gratifying 
the  olfactory  nerve  by  throwing  fresh  perfume  on  the  violet. 
Evidently  the  commercial  advantages  of  deposing  the  dog  from 
the  position  of  Exalted  Personage  and  subduing  him  to  that  of 
Motor  would  not  be  all  clear  gain.  He  would  no  longer  have 
the  spirit  to  send,  Whitmanwise,  his  barbarous  but  beneficent 
yawp  over  the  housetops,  nor  the  leisure  to  throw  off  vast  quan 
tities  of  energy  by  centrifugal  efforts  at  the  conquest  of  his  tail. 
As  to  the  fleas,  he  would  accept  them  with  apathetic  satisfaction 
as  preventives  of  thought  upon  his  fallen  fortunes. 

227 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

Having  observed  with  attention  and  considered  with  seri 
ousness  the  London  Daily  News  declares  its  conviction  that 
the  dog,  as  we  have  the  happiness  to  know  him,  is  dreadfully 
bored  by  civilization.  This  is  one  of  the  gravest  accusations 
that  the  friends  of  progress  and  light  have  been  called  out  to 
meet — a  challenge  that  it  is  impossible  to  ignore  and  unprofit 
able  to  evade;  for  the  dog  as  we  have  the  happiness  to  know 
him  is  the  only  dog  that  we  have  the  happiness  really  to  know. 
The  wolf  is  hardly  a  dog  withija  the  meaning  of  the  law,  nor  is 
the  scalp-yielding  coyote,  whether  he  howls  or  merely  sings 
and  plays  the  piano;  moreover,  these  are  beyond  the  pale  of 
civilization  and  outside  the  scope  of  our  sympathies. 

With  the  dog  it  is  different.  His  place  is  among  us ;  he  is 
with  us  and  of  us — a  part  of  our  life  and  love.  If  we  are  main 
taining  and  promoting  a  condition  of  things  that  gives  him  "that 
tired  feeling"  it  is  befitting  that  we  mend  our  ways  lest,  shaking 
the  carpet  dust  from  his  feet  and  the  tenderloin  steaks  from  his 
teeth,  he  depart  from  our  midst  and  connect  himself  with  the 
enchanted  life  of  the  thrilling  barbarian.  We  can  not  afford  to 
lose  him.  The  cynophobes  may  call  him  a  "survival"  and  sneer 
at  his  exhausted  mandate — albeit,  as  Darwin  points  out,  they 
are  indebted  for  their  sneer  to  his  own  habit  of  uncovering  his 
teeth  to  bite ;  they  may  seek  to  cast  opprobrium  upon  the  nature 
of  our  affection  for  him  by  pronouncing  it  hereditary — a  bequest 
from  our  primitive  ancestors,  for  whom  he  performed  important 
service  in  other  ways  than  depriving  visitors  of  their  tendons; 
but  quite  the  same  we  should  miss  him  at  his  meal  time  and  in 
the  (but  for  him)  silent  watches  of  the  night.  We  should  miss 
his  bark  and  his  bite,  the  feel  of  his  forefeet  upon  our  shirt- 
fronts,  the  frou-frou  of  his  dusty  sides  against  our  nether  habili 
ments.  More  than  all,  we  should  miss  and  mourn  that  visible 

228 


A  Dissertation  on  Dogs 


yearning  for  chops  and  steaks,  which  he  has  persuaded  us  to 
accept  as  the  lovelight  of  his  eye  and  a  tribute  to  our  personal 
worth.  We  must  keep  the  dog,  and  to  that  end  find  means  to 
abate  his  weariness  of  us  and  our  ways. 

Doubtless  much  might  be  done  to  reclaim  our  dogs  from 
their  uncheerful  state  of  mind  by  abstention  from  debate  on  im 
perialism  ;  by  excluding  them  from  the  churches,  at  least  during 
the  sermons ;  by  keeping  them  off  the  streets  and  out  of  hearing 
when  rites  of  prostration  are  in  performance  before  visiting  no 
tables  ;  by  forbidding  anyone  to  read  aloud  in  their  hearing  the 
sensational  articles  in  the  newspapers,  and  by  educating  them 
to  the  belief  that  Labor  and  Capital  are  illusions.  A  limitation 
of  the  annual  output  of  popular  novels  would  undoubtedly  re 
duce  the  dejection,  which  could  be  still  further  mitigated  by 
abolition  of  the  more  successful  magazines.  If  the  dialect  story 
or  poem  could  be  prohibited,  under  severe  penalties,  the  sum  of 
night-howling  (erroneously  attributed  to  lunar  influence) 
would  experience  an  audible  decrement,  which,  also,  would  en 
able  the  fire  department  to  augment  its  own  uproar  without  re 
proach.  There  is,  indeed,  a  considerable  number  of  ways  in 
which  we  might  effect  a  double  reform — promoting  the  advan 
tage  of  Man,  as  well  as  medicating  the  mental  fatigue  of  Dog. 
For  another  example,  it  would  be  "a  boon  and  a  blessing  to 
man"  if  Society  would  put  to  death,  or  at  least  banish,  the  mill- 
man  or  manufacturer  who  persists  in  apprising  the  entire  com 
munity  many  times  a  day  by  means  of  a  steam  whistle  that  it  is 
time  for  his  oppressed  employees  (every  one  of  whom  has 
a  gold  watch)  to  go  to  work  or  to  leave  off.  Such  things 
not  only  make  a  dog  tired,  they  make  a  man  mad.  They 
answer  with  an  accented  affirmative  Truthful  James*  plaintive 
inquiry, 


229 


The  Shadow   on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

"Is  civilization  a  failure, 

Or  is  the  Caucasian  played  out?" 

Unquestionably,  from  his  advantageous  point  of  view  as  a 
looker-on  at  the  game,  the  dog  is  justified  in  the  conviction  that 
they  are. 


230 


The  Ancestral 
Bond       ... 


The  Ancestral  Bond 


WELL-KNOWN  citizen  of  Ohio  once  dis 
covered  another  man  of  the  same  name  exactly  re 
sembling  him,  and  writing  a  "hand"  which,  includ 
ing  the  signature,  he  was  unable  to  distinguish 
from  his  own.  The  two  men  were  unable  to  discover  any  blood 
relationship  between  them.  It  is  nevertheless  almost  absolutely 
certain  that  a  relationship  existed,  though  it  may  have  been  so 
remote  a  degree  that  the  familiar  term  "forty-second  cousin" 
would  not  have  exaggerated  the  slenderness  of  the  tie.  The 
phenomena  of  heredity  have  been  inattentively  noted;  its  laws 
are  imperfectly  understood,  even  by  Herbert  Spencer  and  the 
prophets.  My  own  small  study  in  this  amazing  field  convinces 
me  that  a  man  is  the  sum  of  his  ancestors;  that  his  character, 
moral  and  intellectual,  is  determined  before  his  birth.  His  en 
vironment  with  all  its  varied  suasions,  its  agencies  of  good  and 
evil;  breeding,  training,  interest,  experience  and  the  rest  of 
it — have  little  to  do  with  the  matter  and  can  not  alter  the  sen 
tence  passed  upon  him  at  conception,  compelling  him  to  be 
what  he  is. 

Man  is  the  hither  end  of  an  immeasurable  line  extending 
back  to  the  ultimate  Adam — or,  as  we  scientists  prefer  to  name 
him,  Protoplasmos.  Man  travels,  not  the  mental  road  that  he 
would,  but  the  one  that  he  must — is  pushed  this  way  and  that 
by  the  resultant  of  all  the  forces  behind  him;  for  each  mem 
ber  of  the  ancestral  line,  though  dead,  yet  pusheth.  In  one  of 
what  Dr.  Nolmes  calls  his  "medicated  novels,"  The  Guardian 

233 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

Angel,  this  truth  is  most  admirably  and  lucidly  set  forth  with 
abundant  instance  and  copious  exposition.  Upon  another  work 
of  his,  Elsie  Venner —  in  which  he  erroneously  affirms  the 
influence  of  circumstance  and  environment  —  let  us  lay  a  char 
itable  hand  and  fling  it  into  the  fire. 

Clearly  all  one's  ancestors  have  not  equal  power  in  shaping 
his  character.  Conceiving  them,  according  to  our  figure,  as 
arranged  in  line  behind  him  and  influential  in  the  ratio  of  their 
individuality,  we  shall  get  the  best  notion  of  their  method  by 
supposing  them  to  have  taken  their  places  in  an  order  somewhat 
independent  of  chronology  and  a  little  different  from  their  ar 
rangement  behind  his  brother.  Immediately  at  his  back,  with 
a  controlling  hand  (a  trifle  skinny)  upon  him,  may  stand  his 
great-grandmother,  while  his  father  may  be  many  removes 
arear.  Or  the  place  of  power  may  be  held  by  some  fine  old 
Asian  gentleman  who  flourished  before  the  confusion  of  tongues 
on  the  plain  of  Shinar;  or  by  some  cave-dweller  who  polished 
the  bone  of  life  in  Mesopotamia  and  was  perhaps  a  respectable 
and  honest  troglodyte. 

Sometimes  a  whole  platoon  of  ancestors  appears  to  have 
been  moved  backward  or  forward,  en  bloc,  not,  we  may  be 
sure,  capriciously,  but  in  obedience  to  some  law  that  we  do  not 
understand.  I  know  a  man  to  whose  character  not  an  ancestor 
since  the  seventeenth  century  has  contributed  an  element.  In 
tellectually  he  is  a  contemporary  of  John  Dryden,  whom  natu 
rally  he  reveres  as  the  greatest  of  poets.  I  know  another  who 
has  inherited  his  handwriting  from  his  great-grandfather,  al 
though  he  has  been  trained  to  the  Spencerian  system  and  tried 
hard  to  acquire  it.  Furthermore,  his  handwriting  follows  the 
same  order  of  progressive  development  as  that  of  his  great 
grandfather.  At  the  age  of  twenty  he  wrote  exactly  as  his  an- 

234 


The  Ancestral  Bond 


cestor  did  at  the  same  age,  and,  although  at  forty-five  his  chi- 
rography  is  nothing  like  what  it  was  even  ten  years  ago,  it  is 
accurately  like  his  great-grandfather's  at  forty-five.  It  was 
only  five  years  ago  that  the  discovery  of  some  old  letters  showed 
him  how  his  great-grandfather  wrote,  and  accounted  for  the 
absolute  dissimilarity  of  his  own  handwriting  to  that  of  any 
known  member  of  his  family. 

To  suppose  that  such  individual  traits  as  the  configuration 
of  the  body,  the  color  of  the  hair  and  eyes,  the  shape  of  hands 
and  feet,  the  thousand-and-one  subtle  characteristics  that  make 
family  resemblances  are  transmissible,  and  that  the  form,  texture 
and  capacities  of  the  brain  which  fix  the  degree  of  natural  intel 
lect,  are  not  transmissible,  is  illogical  and  absurd.  We  see  that 
certain  actions,  such  as  gestures,  gait,  and  so  forth,  resulting 
from  the  most  complex  concurrences  of  brain,  nerves  and 
muscles,  are  hereditary.  Is  it  reasonable  to  suppose  that  the 
brain  alone  of  all  the  organs  performs  its  work  according  to  its 
own  sweet  will,  free  from  congenital  tendencies?  Is  it  not  a 
familiar  fact  that  racial  characteristics  are  persistent? — that  one 
race  is  stupid  and  indocile,  another  quick  and  intelligent  ?  Does 
not  each  generation  of  a  race  inherit  the  intellectual  qualities  of 
the  preceding  generation?  How  could  this  be  true  of  genera 
tions  and  not  of  individuals? 

As  to  stirpiculture,  the  intelligent  and  systematic  breeding 
of  men  and  women  with  a  view  to  improvement  of  the  species 
— it  is  a  thing  of  the  far  future,  It  is  hardly  in  sight.  Yet, 
what  splendid  possibilities  it  carries !  Two  or  three  generations 
of  as  careful  breeding  as  we  bestow  on  horses,  dogs  and 
pigeons  would  do  more  good  than  all  the  penal,  reformatory 
and  educating  agencies  of  the  world  accomplish  in  a  thousand 
years.  It  is  the  one  direction  in  which  human  effort  to  "elevate 

235 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

the  race"  can  be  assured  of  a  definitive,  speedy  and  adequate 
success.  It  is  hardly  better  than  nonsense  to  prate  of  any  good 
coming  to  the  race  through  (for  example)  medical  science, 
which  is  mainly  concerned  in  reversing  the  beneficent  operation 
of  natural  laws  and  saving  the  unfittest  to  perpetuate  their  un- 
fitness.  Our  entire  system  of  charities  is  open  to  the  same  objec 
tion;  it  cares  for  the  incapables  whom  Nature  is  trying  to 
"weed  out."  This  not  only  debases  the  race  physically,  intel 
lectually  and  morally,  but  constantly  increases  the  rate  of  de 
basement.  The  proportion  of  criminals,  paupers  and  the  vari 
ous  kinds  of  "inmates"  of  charitable  institutions  augments  its 
horrible  percentage  yearly.  On  the  other  hand,  our  wars  de 
stroy  the  capable;  so  thus  we  make  inroads  upon  the  vitality 
of  the  race  from  two  directions.  We  preserve  the  feeble  and  ex 
tirpate  the  strong.  He  who,  in  view  of  this  amazing  folly  can 
believe  in  a  constant,  even  slow,  progress  of  the  human  race 
toward  perfection  ought  to  be  happy.  He  has  a  mind  whose 
Olympian  heights  are  inaccessible — the  Titans  of  fact  can  never 
scale  them  to  storm  its  ancient  reign. 


236 


The  Right 
to  Work 


The  Right  to  Work 


ILL  kinds  of  relief,  charitable  or  other,  doubtless  tend 
to  perpetuation  of  pauperism,  inasmuch  as  paupers 
are  thereby  kept  alive;  and  living  paupers  un 
questionably  propagate  their  unthrifty  kind  more 
abundantly  than  dead  ones.  It  is  not  true,  though,  that  relief 
interferes  with  Nature's  beneficent  law  of  the  survival  of  the 
fittest,  for  the  power  to  excite  sympathy  and  obtain  relief  is  a 
kind  of  fitness.  I  am  still  a  devotee  of  the  homely  primitive  doc 
trine  that  mischance,  disability  or  even  unthrift,  is  not  a  capital 
crime  justly  and  profitably  punishable  by  starvation.  I  still  re 
gard  the  Good  Samaritan  with  a  certain  toleration  and  Jesus 
Christ's  tenderness  to  the  poor  as  something  more  than  a  policy 
of  obstruction. 

If  no  such  thing  as  an  almshouse,  a  hospital,  an  asylum  or 
any  one  of  the  many  public  establishments  for  relief  of  the  un 
fortunate  were  known  the  proposal  to  found  one  would  indu 
bitably  evoke  from  thousands  of  throats  notes  of  deprecation 
and  predictions  of  disaster.  It  would  be  called  Socialism  of  the 
radical  and  dangerous  kind —  of  a  kind  to  menace  the  stability 
of  government  and  undermine  the  very  foundations  of  organized 
society!  Yet  who  is  more  truly  unfortunate  than  an  able- 
bodied  man  out  of  work  through  no  delinquency  of  will  and  no 
default  of  effort?  Is  hunger  to  him  and  his  less  poignant  than 
to  the  feeble  in  body  and  mind  whom  we  support  for  nothing 
in  almshouse  or  asylum?  Are  cold  and  exposure  less  disagree 
able  to  him  than  to  them?  Is  not  his  claim  to  the  right  to  live 

239 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

as  valid  as  theirs  if  backed  by  the  will  to  pay  for  life  with  work? 
And  in  denial  of  his  claim  is  there  not  latent  a  far  greater  peril 
to  society  than  inheres  in  denial  of  theirs?  So  unfortunate  and 
dangerous  a  creature  as  a  man  willing  to  work,  yet  having  no 
work  to  do,  should  be  unknown  outside  of  the  literature  of  sa 
tire.  Doubtless  there  would  be  enormous  difficulties  in  devising 
a  practicable  and  beneficent  system,  and  doubtless  the  reform, 
like  all  permanent  and  salutary  reforms,  will  have  to  grow. 
The  growth  naturally  will  be  delayed  by  opposition  of  the 
workingmen  themselves — precisely  as  they  oppose  prison  labor 
from  ignorance  that  labor  makes  labor. 

It  matters  not  that  nine  in  ten  of  all  our  tramps  and  va 
grants  are  such  from  choice,  and  irreclaimable  degenerates  into 
the  bargain;  so  long  as  one  worthy  man  is  out  of  employment 
and  unable  to  obtain  it  our  duty  is  to  provide  it  by  law.  Nay, 
so  long  as  industrial  conditions  are  such  that  so  pathetic  a  phe 
nomenon  is  possible  we  have  not  the  moral  right  to  disregard 
that  possiblity.  The  right  to  employment  being  the  right  to 
life,  its  denial  is  homicide.  It  should  be  needless  to  point  out 
the  advantages  of  its  concession.  It  would  preserve  the  life  and 
self-respect  of  him  who  is  needy  through  misfortune,  and  supply 
an  infallible  means  of  detection  of  his  criminal  imitator,  who 
could  then  be  dealt  with  as  he  deserves,  without  the  lenity  that 
finds  justification  in  doubt  and  compassion.  It  would  diminish 
crime,  for  an  empty  stomach  has  no  morals.  With  a  wage  rate 
lower  than  the  commercial,  it  would  disturb  no  private  industries 
by  luring  away  their  workmen,  and  with  nothing  made  to  sell 
there  would  be  no  competition  with  private  products.  Properly 
directed,  it  would  give  us  highways,  bridges  and  embankments 
which  we  shall  not  otherwise  have. 

It  is  difficult  to  say  if  our  laws  relating  to  vagrancy  and  va- 

240 


The  Right  to   Work 


grants  are  more  cruel  or  more  absurd.  If  not  so  atrocious  they 
would  evoke  laughter;  if  less  ridiculous  we  should  read  them 
with  indignation.  Here  is  an  imaginary  conversation : 

THE  LAW:  It  is  forbidden  to  you  to  rob.  It  is  forbid 
den  to  you  to  steal.  It  is  forbidden  to  you  to  beg. 

THE  VAGRANT:  Being  without  money,  and  denied  em 
ployment,  I  am  compelled  to  obtain  food,  shelter  and  clothing 
in  one  of  these  ways,  else  I  shall  be  hungry  and  cold. 

THE  LAW:  That  is  no  affair  of  mine.  Yet  I  am  consid 
erate — you  are  permitted  to  be  as  hungry  as  you  like  and  as 
cold  as  may  suit  you. 

THE  VAGRANT :  Hungry,  yes,  and  many  thanks  to  you ; 
but  if  I  go  naked  I  am  arrested  for  indecent  exposure.  You  re 
quire  me  to  wear  clothing. 

THE  LAW:     You'll  admit  that  you  need  it. 

THE  VAGRANT :  But  not  that  you  provide  a  way  for  me 
to  get  it.  No  one  will  give  me  shelter  at  night ;  you  forbid  me 
to  sleep  in  a  straw  stack. 

THE  LAW:     Ungrateful  man!    we  provide  a  cell. 

THE  VAGRANT :  Even  when  I  obey  you,  starving  all  day 
and  freezing  all  night,  and  holding  my  tongue  with  both  hands, 
I  am  liable  to  arrest  for  being  "without  visible  means  of  sup 
port." 

THE  LAW:     A  most  reprehensible  condition. 

THE  VAGRANT:  One  thing  has  been  overlooked — a 
legal  punishment  for  begging  for  work. 

THE  LAW:     True;   I  am  not  perfect. 


241 


The   Right    to 
Take  Oneself  Off 


The  Right  to   Take  Oneself  Off 


PERSON  who  loses  heart  and  hope  through  a 
personal  bereavement  is  like  a  grain  of  sand  on  the 
seashore  complaining  that  the  tide  has  washed  a 
neighboring  grain  out  of  reach.  He  is  worse,  for 
the  bereaved  grain  cannot  help  itself ;  it  has  to  be  a  grain  of  sand 
and  play  the  game  of  tide,  win  or  lose;  whereas  he  can  quit — 
by  watching  his  opportunity  can  "quit  a  winner."  For  sometimes 
we  do  beat  "the  man  who  keeps  the  table" — never  in  the  long 
run,  but  infrequently  and  out  of  small  stakes.  But  this  is  no 
time  to  "cash  in"  and  go,  for  you  can  not  take  your  little  win 
ning  with  you.  The  time  to  quit  is  when  you  have  lost  a  big 
stake,  your  fool  hope  of  eventual  success,  your  fortitude  and 
your  love  of  the  game.  If  you  stay  in  the  game,  which  you  are 
not  compelled  to  do,  take  your  losses  in  good  temper  and  do  not 
whine  about  them.  They  are  hard  to  bear,  but  that  is  no  reason 
why  you  should  be. 

*  But  we  are  told  with  tiresome  iteration  that  we  are  "put 
here"  for  some  purpose  (not  disclosed)  and  have  no  right  to 
retire  until  summoned — it  may  be  by  small-pox,  it  may  be  by 
the  bludgeon  of  a  blackguard,  it  may  be  by  the  kick  of  a  cow ; 
the  "summoning"  Power  (said  to  be  the  same  as  the  "putting" 
Power)  has  not  a  nice  taste  in  the  choice  of  messengers.  That 
"argument"  is  not  worth  attention,  for  it  is  unsupported  by 
either  evidence  or  anything  remotely  resembling  evidence.  "Put 
here."  Indeed!  And  by  the  keeper  of  the  table  who  "runs" 
the  "skin  game."  We  were  put  here  by  our  parents — that  is  all 

245 


The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

anybody  knows  about  it ;  and  they  had  no  more  authority  than 
we,  and  probably  no  more  intention.  ^ 

The  notion  that  we  have  not  the  right  to  take  our  own  lives 
comes  of  our  consciousness  that  we  have  not  the  courage.  It  is 
the  plea  of  the  coward — his  excuse  for  continuing  to  live  when 
he  has  nothing  to  live  for — or  his  provision  against  such  a  time 
in  the  future.  If  he  were  not  egotist  as  well  as  coward  he 
would  need  no  excuse.  To  one  who  does  not  regard  himself 
as  the  center  of  creation  and  his  sorrow  as  the  throes  of  the 
universe,  life,  if  not  worth  living,  is  also  not  worth  leaving. 
The  ancient  philosopher  who  was  asked  why  he  did  not  die 
if,  as  he  taught,  life  was  no  better  than  death,  replied: 
"Because  death  is  no  better  than  life.'*  We  do  not  know  that 
either  proposition  is  true,  but  the  matter  is  not  worth  bothering 
about,  for  both  states  are  supportable — life  despite  its  pleasures 
and  death  despite  its  repose. 

It  was  Robert  G.  Ingersoll's  opinion  that  there  is  rather  too 
little  than  too  much  suicide  in  the  world — that  people  are  so 
cowardly  as  to  live  on  long  after  endurance  has  ceased  to  be  a 
virtue.  This  view  is  but  a  return  to  the  wisdom  of  the  ancients, 
in  whose  splendid  civilization  suicide  had  as  honorable  place  as 
any  other  courageous,  reasonable  and  unselfish  act.  Antony, 
Brutus,  Cato,  Seneca — these  were  not  of  the  kind  of  men  to  do 
deeds  of  cowardice  and  folly.  The  smug,  self-righteous 
modern  way  of  looking  upon  the  act  as  that  of  a  craven  or  a 
lunatic  is  the  creation  of  priests,  Philistines  and  women.  If 
courage  is  manifest  in  endurance  of  profitless  discomfort  it  is 
cowardice  to  warm  oneself  when  cold,  to  cure  oneself  when  ill, 
to  drive  away  mosquitoes,  to  go  in  when  it  rains.  The  "pur 
suit  of  happiness,"  then,  is  not  an  "inalienable  right,"  for  that 
implies  avoidance  of  pain.  No  principle  is  involved  in  this 

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matter ;  suicide  is  justifiable  or  not,  according  to  circumstances ; 
each  case  is  to  be  considered  on  its  merits  and  he  having  the  act 
under  advisement  is  sole  judge.  To  his  decision,  made  with 
whatever  light  he  may  chance  to  have,  all  honest  minds  will 
bow.  The  appellant  has  no  court  to  which  to  take  his  appeal. 
Nowhere  is  a  jurisdiction  so  comprehensive  as  to  embrace  the 
right  of  condemning  the  wretched  to  life. 

Suicide  is  always  courageous.  We  call  it  courage  in  a 
soldier  merely  to  face  death — say  to  lead  a  forlorn  hope — 
although  he  has  a  chance  of  life  and  a  certainty  of  "glory.** 
But  the  suicide  does  more  than  face  death;  he  incurs  it,  and 
with  a  certainty,  not  of  glory,  but  of  reproach.  If  that  is  not 
courage  we  must  reform  our  vocabulary. 

True,  there  may  be  a  higher  courage  in  living  than  in  dying 
— a  moral  courage  greater  than  physical.  The  courage  of  the 
suicide,  like  that  of  the  pirate,  is  not  incompatible  with  a  selfish 
disregard  of  the  rights  and  interests  of  others — a  cruel  recreancy 
to  duty  and  decency.  I  have  been  asked:  "Do  you  not  think 
it  cowardly  when  a  man  leaves  his  family  unprovided  for,  to 
end  his  life,  because  he  is  dissatisfied  with  life  in  general?*'  No, 
I  do  not;  I  think  it  selfish  and  cruel.  Is  not  that  enough  to  say 
of  it?  Must  we  distort  words  from  their  true  meaning  in  order 
more  effectually  to  damn  the  act  and  cover  its  author  with  a 
greater  infamy?  A  word  means  something;  despite  the  maun- 
derings  of  the  lexicographers,  it  does  not  mean  whatever  you 
want  it  to  mean.  "Cowardice**  means  the  fear  of  danger,  not 
the  shirking  of  duty.  The  writer  who  allows  himself  as  much 
liberty  in  the  use  of  words  as  he  is  allowed  by  the  dictionary- 
maker  and  by  popular  consent  is  a  bad  writer.  He  can  make  no 
impression  on  his  reader,  and  would  do  better  service  at  the 
ribbon-counter. 

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The  Shadow  on  the  Dial  and  other  Essays 

The  ethics  of  suicide  is  not  a  simple  matter ;  one  can  not  lay 
down  laws  of  universal  application,  but  each  case  is  to  be 
judged,  if  judged  at  all,  with  a  full  knowledge  of  all  the  cir 
cumstances,  including  the  mental  and  moral  make-up  of  the  per 
son  taking  his  own  life — an  impossible  qualification  for  judg 
ment.  One's  time,  race  and  religion  have  much  to  do  with  it. 
Some  people,  like  the  ancient  Romans  and  the  modern  Japanese, 
have  considered  suicide  in  certain  circumstances  honorable  and 
obligatory;  among  ourselves  it  is  held  in  disfavor.  A  man  of 
sense  will  not  give  much  attention  to  considerations  of  that  kind, 
excepting  in  so  far  as  they  affect  others,  but  in  judging  weak 
offenders  they  are  to  be  taken  into  the  account.  Speaking 
generally,  then,  I  should  say  that  in  our  time  and  country  the 
following  persons  (and  some  others)  are  justified  in  removing 
themselves,  and  that  to  some  of  them  it  is  a  duty : 

One  afflicted  with  a  painful  or  loathsome  and  incurable 
disease. 

One  who  is  a  heavy  burden  to  his  friends,  with  no  pro 
spect  of  their  relief. 

One  threatened  with  permanent  insanity. 

One  irreclaimably  addicted  to  drunkenness  or  some  sim 
ilarly  destructive  or  offensive  habit. 

One  without  friends,  property,  employment  or  hope. 

One  who  has  disgraced  himself. 

Why  do  we  honor  the  valiant  soldier,  sailor,  fireman?  For 
obedience  to  duty?  Not  at  all;  that  alone — without  the 
peril — seldom  elicits  remark,  never  evokes  enthusiasm.  It  is 
because  he  faced  without  flinching  the  risk  of  that  supreme 
disaster — or  what  we  feel  to  be  such — death.  But  look  you: 
the  soldier  braves  the  danger  of  death ;  the  suicide  braves  death 
itself !  The  leader  of  the  forlorn  hope  may  not  be  struck.  The 

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sailor  who  voluntarily  goes  down  with  his  ship  may  be  picked 
up  or  cast  ashore.  It  is  not  certain  that  the  wall  will  topple 
until  the  fireman  shall  have  descended  with  his  precious  burden. 
But  the  suicide — his  is  the  foeman  that  never  missed  a  mark,  his 
the  sea  that  gives  nothing  back;  the  wall  that  he  mounts  bears 
no  man's  weight.  And  his,  at  the  end  of  it  all,  is  the  dis 
honored  grave  where  the  wild  ass  of  public  opinion 

"Stamps  o'er  his  head  but  can  not  break  his  sleep." 


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2lA-60m-4,'64 
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GENERAL  LIBRARY  -  U.C.  BERKELEY 


